The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, giving viewers a glimpse of a darkly humorous cooperative cult simulation. In the teaser, robed followers zip around on pig‑back, firing machine guns before the camera pulls back to reveal massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacles looming in the distance. One detail that didn’t make the final cut was the infamous "snake gun," a weapon that, according to Joe Dietsch—CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games—originated from a simple suggestion by a team member’s child. "His son asked, ‘What if there was a snake gun?’" Dietsch recalled.
"Because we had built a modular gun system, I was able to prototype a snake‑shooting weapon in roughly thirty minutes. The kid went wild, and we kept it in the game." That anecdote perfectly captures the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises. Set in an open‑world sandbox, players can recruit followers—or invite friends in co‑op mode—to build a 1970s‑style cult, complete with bizarre rituals, improvised weaponry, and an ever‑expanding map that encourages both survival and mayhem. Yet the game’s grand ambitions are being realized by a remarkably small team.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, summed up their philosophy: "We wanted to be disruptors. While everyone assumed you needed a hundred‑person studio to produce a high‑fidelity open world, we believed twelve talented people could do it." The founders’ confidence stems from a background in indie filmmaking, where doing more with less is the norm. "We come from indie film circles and are used to punching well above our weight," Abbott explained. Their journey to funding was anything but smooth; after 80 pitches, the studio finally secured equity investment from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which now hold stakes in Wolf Haus.
The team’s Hollywood roots run deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of 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, a production house founded by Chris Roberts before he turned his attention to Star Citizen. Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84, starring Jamie Foxx.
These connections gave the studio a unique blend of cinematic storytelling and production discipline. Join Us began as a modest experiment in Unreal Engine.
"I discovered that Unreal Engine was free to download and started tinkering with it using YouTube tutorials," Dietsch said. Though he had never built a game before, he managed to create a few small prototypes before committing to a larger vision: a doomsday cult simulator that merged his love of grindhouse cinema with survival‑game mechanics.
He built a proof‑of‑concept demo and showed it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, a partner that helped shape the project’s direction. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s chief financial officer and narrative director, brings a hybrid background of film production and video‑game writing. Early in his career he wrote for titles such as Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins through his company Sekretagent Productions. Later, he founded several tech ventures, including the cannabis formulation firm Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million.
After a brief retirement on a remote Canadian island, a call from his old Hollywood roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back into the industry. Impressed by Dietsch’s demo, Wendschuh helped recruit seasoned industry veterans—Reid Schneider, former Warner Bros.
Games VP, and Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, ex‑Ubisoft Montreal programmer—to serve as strategic advisor and chief technology officer respectively. Securing financing proved challenging amid a market downturn in 2023.
The studio’s early pitches generated curiosity but not commitment. After partnering with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) and re‑pitching in 2024, Wolf Haus finally closed a seed round with Kraftor and Lifelike Capital. Wendschuh credits CAA’s clout and the presence of veteran advisors for opening doors that might otherwise have remained closed.
Despite the high‑profile backers, the studio has deliberately kept its headcount low—13 full‑time staff members at the time of writing. "We wanted a small‑team environment where everyone has a voice and can touch every aspect of the creative process," Dietsch explained.
To make such an ambitious project feasible, the team invested heavily in custom tooling from the outset. "If a system exists in the game, it must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," he said. The first year of development was therefore split between ideating gameplay features and building the internal tools that would allow those features to scale across a six‑kilometre‑square open world without collapsing under their own weight.
The equity‑funding model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools. "Krafton and Lifelike’s investment has essentially self‑funded the game," Wendschuh noted. While the studio is now exploring project finance for marketing, the core development has been covered entirely by the equity partners. This arrangement aligns investor incentives with the studio’s long‑term goal of increasing enterprise value, encouraging the team to keep building reusable tools even when it slows immediate progress.
In an industry where generative AI is increasingly touted as a shortcut, Wolf Haus has deliberately steered clear of it for creative work. "We don’t use generative AI in the game’s development because we believe a human touch is essential," Dietsch asserted. The studio does employ AI‑powered services for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting, but nothing that influences art, design, or narrative.
Interestingly, Krafton—publicly positioning itself as an "AI‑first" company—specifically required that Wolf Haus not rely on generative AI for its creative pipeline. This stance mirrors that of Neon Giant, another Krafton‑owned studio that publicly denied using AI for its projects.
The commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s massive map and voice work. The entire six‑kilometre‑square world was manually built, and all 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors, a point the team emphasizes as a badge of pride.
"Even as a tiny indie, we felt it was vital to keep the experience human‑driven," Wendschuh said. Dietsch also highlighted a key advantage of game development over film: immediacy. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialize, requiring endless approvals, casting, and location scouting. In contrast, a game concept can be prototyped within hours, allowing developers to see their vision in real time.
"You can have an idea at breakfast and test it in the engine by lunch," he said, describing the thrill of instant feedback. Wendschuh added that while film production is heavily front‑loaded—requiring big‑name talent to secure financing—games have far fewer gatekeepers. "Anyone can rent a camera and shoot a backyard movie, but without star power or a distribution deal, success is unlikely.
With games, the barrier to entry is lower, and you don’t need an A‑list actor or director to attract an audience," he explained. Both founders agree that the core creative impulse remains the same across mediums: telling stories and delivering experiences.
"When I was six, I wanted to make either movies or games; it boiled down to a coin toss and a Christmas camera," Dietsch recalled. He learned programming on a TI‑83 calculator and has never stopped exploring the intersection of narrative and interactivity. "Whether it’s film or a video game, you’re crafting an experience, telling a story, and engaging the audience. The tools change, but the goal stays the same."