Steam

Same as torrents, some form of signing keys?

I was thinking federation for the social aspect of it, not the distribution aspect of it.

Distribution would be "the usual". Stores acquire software, and licenses, store and serve the data through a server. Client software solve installation and integration between games and social stuff, like friends, messages, networking and achievements.

I mean, it's not a one person project, but if I were supreme leader of Vietnam and had the people and resources to be working on providing video game entertainment for the masses, that's how I'd be thinking about it. Not that software skills and supreme leader skills have any overlap...