I don't know about Australia specifically but usually when consumer legislation doesn't mention time frame there's still a limitation on how long after the contract of sale that you can bring a case against the seller, and this serves as the practical time frame as there's no way to enforce a refund without going to court.
IANAL but I do run a business that's subject to Australian consumer law. The limitations are not based on the date of the contract of sale, but the date on which the consumer became aware (or reasonably could have been aware) the product was defective, and/or an action was taken by some party to render the product defective.
The consumer legislation does specify a six-year time limit from then on, but that clock only just started ticking.
However, a refund is not obligatory. Repair i.e. a patch is an acceptable remedy under ACL.
You may be right but my reading of this would breach the ACL for “Undisturbed Possession of Goods”. That is - unless you told the customer the game had a limited life you can’t stop them using it. Doing so triggers a “remedy” - which - for a “major fault” is a refund.
This can’t be hidden in a EULA. It has to be prominent or the term will be ruled invalid under the “Unfair Contract Term” provisions of the ACL.
For those not familiar, ACL trumps all consumer contracts with standard terms. There are penalties for misrepresenting ACL (eg “No refunds” signs are banned, so are limits to consequential damages. Warranties are for a “reasonable” time, etc. )
No. The legislation's definition of "major failure" includes several clear statements that if a remedy can be/is made by the supplier, the failure is not a major failure.
That applies to warranties, production defects or (as the GP says) things breaking due to normal use. It doesn't apply to things breaking because the publisher put a kill switch in the device.
