I mentioned Greg Costikyan‘s desire for a utopian gaming distribution method back when I was blogging at the Evil Network, and now it looks as though that ideal is finally starting to work its way into a real PC content delivery system.

A typical game store has fewer than 200 facings. Yet thousands of titles are released each year. The result is that a game has two weeks or less to establish itself–and if it isn’t selling through in that short time-frame, it’s into the bargain bin to make room for the next title.

The result: highly hyped mediocre games win out over stealth masterpieces. There is no time for word-of-mouth to do its magic, no way to build a groundswell of enthusiasm for a fine new game.

And as a result (also of the high budgets required for A-level titles), the conventional channel is no longer interested in any game that can’t project a bare minimum of 300,000 unit sales. There is no room for games with niche appeal–or even for games in genres that still have a following, but cannot generate those kinds of sales. Computer wargames, graphic adventures, flight sims, turn-based fantasy, 4X–they’re all gradually disappearing from the shelves.

We say the hell with this. Broadband is spreading. Shelfspace is not an issue on the Internet. Let’s move online–and let’s offer as many titles, of as many different types, as we can. Let’s appeal to every niche we can find, and let’s make it possible for someone who controls his budget, and knows he can sell 10,000 copies, to make a decent living doing so.

Greg makes it impossible to NOT support this kind of system. It’s essentially the same ideal and method of delivery that makes social software on the internet such a mind-blowing success. Sites like digg and YouTube and services like blogging and photo sharing are all built on the foundation of freedom. The user gets to control the content and what they see. The experience is no longer managed by some faceless publishing and/or distribution overlord. It’s in your hands. It’s the very essence of freedom. That’s why you have to support an effort like Manifesto Games. Because those publishing overlords? They hate our freedom. Let’s fight them together using our armament of consumer dollars.