The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous cooperative cult simulation. In the clip, robed followers zip around on pigs, unleash a barrage of machine‑gun fire, and the sequence culminates with an image of colossal, Cthulhu‑like tentacles. One of the most memorable, yet omitted, moments was the appearance of a snake‑shooting weapon, a feature that Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, attributes to a spontaneous idea from a team member’s child. "His son asked, ‘What would a snake gun look like?’" Dietsch recalls.
"Because we had built a modular gun system that could be scaled in minutes, I was able to prototype a snake‑firing weapon in about half an hour. The kid went wild, and we kept the gun in the final build." That anecdote captures the chaotic, improvisational spirit that defines Join Us. The game is an open‑world sandbox survival experience where players can recruit AI followers or invite friends into a 1970s‑style cult.
The developers’ technology‑first mindset has allowed them to produce a high‑fidelity, large‑scale title with a surprisingly small staff. Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, summed up their ambition: "We set out to be disruptors. We told everyone we could deliver a AAA‑level experience with just twelve people, and most people thought we were crazy." The team’s confidence stems from a history of achieving big results on shoestring budgets. "Our background is indie filmmaking, where you learn to punch far above your weight," Abbott explains.
After an arduous 80‑pitch marathon, Wolf Haus secured equity financing from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in the studio. The founders’ Hollywood connections run deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of actor Mel Gibson, and the two later co‑wrote and co‑directed the indie features Happy Hunting and Manifest West. Abbott is the son of veteran makeup artist Larry Abbott and helped launch Ascendant Pictures, the production company founded by Chris Roberts before his transition to Star Citizen.
Abbott also produced movies such as Fight for ’84, starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us originated from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "I discovered the engine was free to download, and I’d always loved games but felt blocked by the cost of creating them," he says. He taught himself through YouTube tutorials, built a few modest prototypes, and eventually settled on a doomsday cult simulator that merged his love of survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics.
He created a proof‑of‑concept demo, expecting to hit a technical wall quickly. When he showed the demo to Abbott, the latter recognized its potential and introduced it to Dooma, the studio’s early‑stage partner.
Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, had begun his career as a film producer and screenwriter before moving into games in the early 2000s, contributing writing to titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins. He later founded several tech ventures, including the cannabis formulation firm Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million. After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire. Yet a call from his old Hollywood‑hills roommate, Michael Abbott, pulled him back.
"I saw the prototype and it blew my mind, so I left retirement to join the project," Wendschuh recounts. He then recruited Reid Schneider, former VP at Warner Bros. Games and now head of Raccoon Logic, as a strategic advisor, and brought Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, on board as chief technology officer.
With a core team taking shape, the next hurdle was financing. The studio began pitching in the summer of 2023, a period marked by an industry downturn. Despite the market headwinds, the game’s unique premise attracted interest.
Wolf Haus partnered with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) for representation, which helped open doors to investors. By 2024 they closed a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton.
Abbott notes that CAA’s involvement, along with veteran advisors like Schneider and Chartrand, was instrumental. "Our agent Derek Douglas had represented me for over a decade and previously led the video‑game department at William Morris," says Wendschuh. This pedigree gave the studio credibility despite its modest size.
The final roster consists of just thirteen full‑time employees. Dietsch emphasizes that the small‑team model is intentional: "We wanted everyone to have a voice, to touch the creative process, and to feel ownership over a game that truly reflects our collective vision." To make such an ambitious title feasible, Wolf Haus invested heavily in internal tooling from day one. "Any system we build must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch explains.
The studio devoted a large portion of the first development year to constructing a robust toolset that could support an expansive open world without collapsing under its own complexity. This approach also future‑proofs the studio, allowing them to reuse tools for subsequent projects.
The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools. "Krafton and Lifelike’s investments have essentially self‑funded the game," Wendschuh says.
While a modest amount of project finance is being used for marketing, the core development budget comes from the equity partners. This arrangement aligns investor incentives with the studio’s long‑term value creation and encourages the continued building of proprietary tools.
When asked about the role of generative AI, Dietsch is unequivocal: the studio does not employ it for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential to game development. Automating creativity would defeat the reason we get up every morning," he states.
Wendschuh adds that the team only uses AI for administrative tasks such as calendar management and email drafting, not for design, art, or narrative. Krafton, despite branding itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in the creative pipeline.
This mirrors a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant, which publicly distanced itself from the parent company's AI pivot. Both studios stress the importance of preserving jobs for voice actors, artists, and other creatives.
Indeed, every square kilometre of Join Us’s six‑kilometre‑wide map is handcrafted, and the game features roughly 15,000 voice lines recorded by human actors. Dietsch stresses that this commitment to hand‑crafted content is a point of pride, especially for an indie‑scale operation. Dietsch also reflects on the differences between film and game production. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring countless approvals and the involvement of high‑profile talent before a studio greenlights the project.
By contrast, a game idea can be prototyped within hours and tested directly in the engine, offering immediate feedback and creative freedom. "You can take a concept from a morning brainstorm to a playable scene by lunchtime," he says, highlighting the medium’s agility. Wendschuh observes that film production is heavily front‑loaded: securing directors, actors, and financing before any shooting begins.
While anyone can technically shoot a low‑budget film with a backyard camera, breaking through without star power or distribution is rare. Games, however, have far fewer gatekeepers. "You don’t need an A‑list actor or director to launch a successful game," he notes, underscoring the democratizing potential of interactive media.
Both founders agree that the core creative drive—telling stories and delivering experiences—remains the same across mediums. Dietsch recalls his childhood fascination with both games and movies, learning programming on a TI‑83 calculator and dreaming of making movies with a Christmas‑gift camera. Whether through film or interactive entertainment, the goal is to engage audiences, convey narratives, and spark emotion.
In summary, Wolf Haus’s Join Us exemplifies how a small, tightly knit team with Hollywood lineage, savvy tech development, and disciplined financing can produce a large‑scale, high‑quality game without relying on generative AI. Their story illustrates the power of cross‑industry experience, tool‑centric pipelines, and a steadfast belief in human‑driven creativity.