The trailer for Join Us first caught the public eye during the Xbox Showcase in June, presenting a darkly humorous cooperative cult simulation where robed followers zip around on pigs, unleash machine‑gun fire, and culminate in a showdown with colossal, Cthulhu‑like tentacles. What didn’t make the cut, according to Joe Dietsch—CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, the studio behind the title—was the infamous snake‑gun.
"One of the developers’ kids came up with the idea and asked, ‘What would a snake‑gun look like?’ We had a modular weapon system that let us prototype something in about thirty minutes, so I built a gun that literally fired snakes. The kid was blown away, and the weapon stayed in the final build," Dietsch recounts.
This anecdote exemplifies the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises: an open‑world sandbox where players can recruit followers—or friends in co‑op mode—to a 1970s‑style cult, all while wielding absurd weapons and navigating a bizarre, post‑apocalyptic landscape. The game’s development story is equally unconventional. Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, describes the studio’s ambition as a deliberate disruption of industry norms.
"We told ourselves, ‘We don’t need a hundred‑person team; twelve talented people can deliver a AAA‑level experience.’ Everyone else thought we were insane," he says. Their confidence stems from a background in indie filmmaking, where small crews routinely punch far above their budgetary weight. After a grueling 80‑pitch marathon, the team finally secured equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which now hold stakes in Wolf Haus. The founders’ Hollywood connections run deep.
Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson—son of famed 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, a production house founded by Chris Roberts before his transition to the Star Citizen universe. Abbott’s résumé also includes producing credits on movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx.
Join Us originated from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "I discovered Unreal was free to download and started learning from YouTube tutorials," he explains. Though he had never built a commercial game before, he quickly put together a few small prototypes.
The concept that persisted was a doomsday cult simulator that merged survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics—a hybrid that would later become the core intellectual property of Wolf Haus. To test the idea, Dietsch created a proof‑of‑concept demo and showed it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, a production partner.
Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, began his career as a film producer and screenwriter before pivoting to games in the early 2000s, contributing writing to titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins. In the 2010s he founded several tech ventures, most notably the cannabis formulation company Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million (US$330 million). After cashing out, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire. A sudden call from his old Hollywood‑hills roommate Michael Abbott, however, pulled him back into development.
Impressed by Dietsch’s demo, Wendschuh re‑entered the industry, bringing on former Warner Bros. Games VP Reid Schneider as a strategic advisor and recruiting former Ubisoft Montreal programmer Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand as chief technology officer. Funding proved to be the next hurdle. The studio began pitching in the summer of 2023, a period marked by a broader industry downturn.
Despite enthusiastic reactions to the game’s concept, securing capital was challenging. After partnering with CAA (Creative Artists Agency) and re‑launching their pitch in 2024, Wolf Haus finally closed a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton. Wendschuh credits the CAA connection—whose roster includes titles like 007: First Light—and the presence of veteran advisors for opening doors that would otherwise remain closed.
What truly sets Join Us apart is the scale of its ambition relative to the size of the team. With only 13 full‑time staff members, Wolf Haus deliberately built a development pipeline that emphasizes tool creation and individual autonomy. "Every system we implement must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," says Dietsch. The first year of production was split evenly between designing gameplay concepts and engineering the internal tools that would later allow those concepts to flourish across a six‑kilometre‑square open world.
This tooling‑first philosophy not only prevents the project from collapsing under its own complexity but also establishes a reusable foundation for future titles. The equity financing model gave Wolf Haus the breathing room to perfect these tools. Krafton and Lifelike’s investment was used directly to fund development, keeping the project essentially self‑sustaining. While a modest amount of project finance is now being allocated for marketing, the core development budget remains fully covered by the equity partners.
"Equity investors care about the studio’s enterprise value, so they encourage us to invest heavily in tooling," Wendschuh explains. "When we hit a technical roadblock, we simply build a bespoke tool to solve it, even if it slows short‑term progress. That approach lets a tiny team achieve something that would normally require dozens of engineers." In an era where many studios tout generative‑AI pipelines, Wolf Haus has taken a contrary stance.
"We don’t use generative AI for any creative work," Dietsch affirms. "Our process is entirely human‑driven; the idea of handing development over to an algorithm would defeat the purpose of why we love making games." Wendschuh adds that the studio only employs AI for administrative tasks like calendar management and email drafting. Krafton, despite branding itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in the creative pipeline as a condition of its investment—mirroring similar statements from Krafton‑owned Neon Giant, which publicly distanced itself from AI‑centric development. The commitment to human craftsmanship extends to the game’s assets.
The entire six‑kilometre‑square map was hand‑sculpted, and the 15,000 voice lines were recorded by real actors, not synthetic voices. Dietsch emphasizes that this decision was intentional, even for an indie‑scale project, because preserving a human touch is central to the studio’s ethos.
Dietsch also reflects on the differences between filmmaking and game development. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialize, requiring approvals, casting, and extensive pre‑production before a single frame is shot. By contrast, a game concept can be prototyped in a matter of hours: "You can have an idea this morning, drop it into the engine, and see it instantly. That immediacy is exhilarating." Wendschuh notes that film production is heavily front‑loaded, with massive coordination required to secure a handful of high‑profile talent before a project ever sees the light of day.
While anyone can technically shoot a movie with a consumer‑grade camera, the odds of that film breaking through without star power or a distribution deal are slim. Games, however, have a lower barrier to entry and fewer gatekeepers, allowing small teams to reach a global audience without A‑list names. Both founders agree that the core creative drive—telling stories and delivering experiences—remains the same across mediums.
"When I was six, I wanted to make either movies or games; it boiled down to a coin toss and getting a camera for Christmas," Dietsch recalls. He taught himself programming on a TI‑83 calculator, merging his love for both visual storytelling and interactive design. "Whether you’re making a film or a game, you’re crafting an experience, a narrative, an emotional journey for the audience.
That fundamental goal never changes."