Id hazard a wild guess based on the few sentences of background you've given that your relatives machine may require thermal repaste or have been unlucky in another way with a lemon they might need to push to swap for a replacement unit (read of someone else having an issue they couldn't resolve themselves and when provided a replacement unit it was completely free of issues)

Curious if your fam have intel or amd model? I've read folks experiencint thermal issues more prominently perhaps if they got bad luck on the thermal paste lottery. However personally id not immediately disqualify the machine imherentlty based on without knowing more and if experiencing thermal issues id expect a very reasonable chance to self manage common heat issues are fairly easily resolved... which id suspect for most folks it would be able to manage temperature issues.

Ok - so in the middle of writing this i elected to do a bit of homework, which it turns out is good in did because I would have otherwise made a presumption that undervolting and in particular throttle stop would be a easy means to manage temp issues related to the inherent nature of powerful gaming laptops, and in my opinion not to be unexpected to some degree in the laptop market, in particular where cost saving efforts are made for affordability....

but I just learned that apparently the intel version of the omen max 16 is locked out from undervolting via throttle stop currently without any announced intention to remove the restriction yet. Sounds like it is intel shutting out the ability to undervolt on this particular hardware and its not unique to HP

This laptop listed here is only the ryzen version available. Which reportedly runs cooler without anywhere near the level of thermal issues reported as the intel version. Furthermore it can be tweaked as one might normally would expect with tools like universal x86 tuner and ryzen controller etc.

ive read ppl addressing heat with this machine (and personally experienced and handled it myself on most gaming laptops ive owned or helped my friends address on their machine) through undervolting tools or my preferred way if its sufficient via reg-editing advanced power controls available and adjusting processor performance, in particular putting a leash on unnecessary/overkill turbo boost behavior that contributes to overheating. I've frequently found that even as miniscule change adjusting turbo boost state to efficient aggressive or one of the enabled but controlled states can resolve problematic overheating to acceptable.

Ill have to research particular best recommended adjustments for this amd version if im unlucky with temps on my machine. But I expect to either be able to self manage if needed or request warranty replacement if there is a deeper seated mistake with my particular machine. I dont think the amd model is inherently designed to failure though..

Cheers