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Comment by jph00 | Hacker News Reader

The Australian law in question requires refunds be made available if you can show that the product was not "fit for the purpose for which they were sold". It is an entirely reasonable expectation for a purchaser to make of a product, and entirely reasonable that they should receive a refund where that expectation is not met.

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Refunds apply:

> if the request is made within fourteen days of purchase, and the title has been played for less than two hours

Based on the premise that games are made for entertainment, 2 hours seems (to me) like a solid enough amount of time to figure out if something's worth it or not.

What if the game has a showstopper bug in hour #3 of gameplay?

It’s not fit for purpose.

To add to your point, there are many types of games that dont even let you get to all the features until pretty far in. Brutal legend basically changed genres mid game, thats not a 2 hour find

This seems quite far removed from the issue being discussed. Having features late in the game that you don't enjoy hardly means the game isn't fit for purpose. That's like saying a novel isn't fit for purpose unless you enjoy the ending.

I think the point the above poster is making is that features may very well be broken deep in to a game and you just don't know until you get there.

One of the listed items under the ACCC's guide for "major" problems is: "it is significantly different from the sample or description".

So, it could be argued that such a sudden change, if not clearly advertised, could constitute an issue for the product under their guarantees.

I agree that it could be argued, but it seems like a pretty big stretch. I mean, if it's advertised as a multiplayer racing game and there's no multiplayer or racing that's one thing. But if it's advertised as a PC adventure game and it turns out to be a PC adventure game whose story goes differently than you hoped, it sounds very much like something the ACCC standards don't cover.

> But if it's advertised as a PC adventure game and it turns out to be a PC adventure game whose story goes differently than you hoped

That wouldn't fly. Significant difference, however, would.

For Brutal Legend, you'll notice almost all advertising lists both adventure and real time strategy, to avoid such a problem.

I meant more that you could be sold on a feature that is marketed but not available until sinking 10s of hours into a game. When you get to that point however, there is no guarantee that the marketed feature works as advertised, or even works at all

This is the limit for a no-questions-asked refund that is automatically available.

If you run into a bigger issue you can contact support.

There was once a case where a supposedly multi-level game contained only one unbeatable level that seemed like it was supposed to waste over 2 hours to lock you out of refund. Valve made that game refundable at any time and now it's off Steam (at least I can't find it, the developer said it was the wrong build but I'm quite skeptical at this point)[0].

Of course Steam support is total hit and miss, i.e. I once reported an error on their website (I got "An error occurred while processing your request." in the store + some long GUID so I reported it to them) and I got told to check if my internet connection is okay which is fucking ridiculous.

But if it blows up on social media and in news (like [0] did) or there is legal threat (like with this article linked here or soon with CS:GO gambling, maybe) then they take action.

[0] - https://www.vg247.com/2015/08/07/amazingly-broken-steam-game...

Yes but the Australian Consumer Law specifically has penalties for misleading consumers about their rights - which steam does.

ACL > Steam terms of service, full stop. Any barriers Steam put up to knowing about or exercising your ACL rights are illegal.

Depends on the type of 'game'.

For eg. a racing sim, it could take 90+ minutes just to set up controls satisfactorily (this has happened to me).

And for some titles, even getting them running is something that previously takes hours. Stream counts any time the game exe is running as play time, regardless of playability.

i wonder what 'the purpose' of video games are, in the judiciary's eyes. if i didn't like the ending of a game, is it thereby not fit for purpose?

whitebox goods have set plenty of precedents for such reasoning - if it works as advertised, then you can't return it simply because you didn't like what it did (or its looks etc, or that it didn't fit your cabinet/spacing etc). It has to be defective, or didn't perform the full range of functions that is advertised.

For a video game, i'd assume that as long as the game ran (no crashing etc), and the game has all the elements that is advertised, you can't return it for a refund.

A good example was no man's sky. I would say it's refund-worthy, since they advertised that it is possible to multiplayer, and meet other people.

See my comment above;

> if the request is made within fourteen days of purchase, and the title has been played for less than two hours

Purpose of games, is entertainment.

2 hours should be enough for you to decide if the game was worth it or not.

Let's say the average game gives you 40 hours of entertainment. (Bit arbitrary, granted.)

2 hours would be 5% of it's total lifespan.

Sounds reasonable?

40 hours is not a good guess at a game's play time. Many indie games are around 4h long. I've played a story game that was only 2 hours long

> Sounds reasonable?

Not under the Australian consumer law. We’re (rightly) quite proud of the level of protection it affords consumers.

Let's also say there's a show-stopping bug that kills your save at hour 37.

You might have enjoyed the game, but due to its broken nature, you are still entitled to a refund under Australian Consumer Rights.

Just to back up my statement above with actual ACCC advice:

"it has a problem that would have stopped someone from buying it if they’d known about it" is considered a "major" problem with the product.

2 hours should be enough for you to decide if the game was worth it or not.

This seems to be straying off-topic. The question isn't whether it was worth the price paid. The question is does it violate consumer protection laws vis-a-vis does it do what they said it would.

Sounds reasonable?

It does not. Applying a uniform hard limit to the full range of all possible games seems unreasonable. Practical, but not reasonable.

Would bad PC-Ports with a ruined UI qualify to that?

That depends on the advertising for the PC platform.

If "it is significantly different from the sample or description" or "it has a problem that would have stopped someone from buying it if they’d known about it" or "it doesn’t do what the business said it would, or what you asked for and can’t easily be fixed." Then yes, it would qualify.

So a bad port that still used the same graphics from the original platform to advertise could be an issue. Or if it contained show-stopping bugs, it could be a problem. Or if the business drops features after you purchase.

"fit for the purpose for which they were sold"

Does that mean in Australia you can return your iPhone when it slows down?

At the time of sale the phone wasn't defective.

So what if a game breaking bug introduced with a later content patch? At the time of the sale the game wasn't defective

That's mostly irrelevant under Consumer Rights.

However, the phone slowing down probably doesn't constitute a major problem, but rather a minor one.

If only a minor problem exists, Apple has the choice of giving you a free repair, replacement or refund, but which is up to them.

So I expect in this particular case, they'll just give you a new battery and the problem will be solved.

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