Lost Game Based on Orwell’s ‘1984’ Found After 26 Years, Available on PC

More than a quarter of a century later, an early version of Big Brother, based on the cult novel 1984 by George Orwell, has suddenly appeared online. For a long time, the project was considered irretrievably lost, but now it can be launched on a PC. Windows 11 owners must manually copy the Brother and BRENDER folders to the C drive to install the game.

Big Brother was developed by MediaX, known for Queensrÿche’s Promised Land. The game was not a direct adaptation of the book, but offered an alternative history in the same universe. The main character was Eric Blair (a reference to Orwell’s real name), who returned to his country and discovered that society was now completely controlled by Big Brother and the Thought Police. During the game, the character had to explore the world, solve puzzles and help the rebels in the fight against the regime.

The project was presented at E3 1998, but was closed shortly after. For a long time, it was believed that all copies of Big Brother had disappeared, but recently user Shed_Troll discovered a disc with an alpha build from 1999 and uploaded it to Archive.org, bringing the game back from oblivion.