Bankruptcy auctions don't usually get much publicity, and that's exactly how potential bidders like it, especially when the auction is for a defunct games development studio. And the pick of the spoils from a recent United Front Games (UFG) bankruptcy sell off is a PS4 development kit with a hard drive full of data.
UFG was a Canadian games developer based in Vancouver, which sadly closed its doors back in October just shy of celebrating a decade of making games. UFG had a great track record, developing ModNation Racers, Sleeping Dogs, LittleBigPlanet Karting, Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, and Marvel Battlegrounds. Two further games were also developed there: Smash+Grab and Triad Wars, but never saw a release.
One of the items sold off in the UFG auction was a PS4 Neo development kit, with the Neo signifying it included the hardware necessary to create and test games for the higher performing PS4 Pro. The lucky winner is Reddit user kaneda2004 who discovered 800GB of encrypted data on the hard drive.
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As Kotaku explains, on Sony's dev kits, the data only remains accessible if a deveoper license is maintained on the device. This license needs renewing every 90 days, which is why the data is currently inaccessible. However, kaneda2004 has been in contact with forum members at Assembler Games and work is now underway to try and unencrypt the data.
I suspect what they will find is a mix of data relating to previously released titles on Sony platforms which were potentially getting a PS4 Pro upgrade patch. The data may uncover a new game we haven't heard about before, but I won't be holding my breath for a major discovery.