The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous cooperative cult simulator. In the clip, robed followers zip around on pigs, wielding machine guns, before the scene shifts to a monstrous, Cthulhu‑like mass of tentacles.
One element that didn’t make the public cut was the "snake gun," a quirky weapon that Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, says was inspired by a junior team member’s son. "He asked, ‘What if there was a gun that fired snakes?’ We had a modular weapon system, so within half an hour I built a snake‑shooting gun.
It blew his mind and it stayed in the final build," Dietsch recalls. That anecdote captures the chaotic, improvisational spirit of Join Us, an open‑world sandbox survival game where players can recruit followers—or other players in co‑op mode—to build a 1970s‑style cult. It also illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has allowed a small crew to produce a high‑fidelity title that would normally require a much larger staff.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, explains their ambition: "We set out to be disruptors. Everyone told us a twelve‑person team couldn’t deliver a game of this scale, but we proved them wrong." The team’s confidence stems from a background in low‑budget, high‑impact indie filmmaking. "We’re used to punching well above our weight," Abbott says. After 80 pitch meetings, Wolf Haus finally secured equity funding 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 Mel Gibson, who co‑founded Wolf Haus and 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 company originally founded by Chris Roberts before his work on Star Citizen. Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us began as a personal experiment in Unreal Engine.
"I discovered Unreal was free to download and started tinkering after watching YouTube tutorials," Dietsch explains. Though he had no formal training, he built a few small prototypes before deciding to tackle a larger vision: a doomsday cult simulator that blended survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics. He created a proof‑of‑concept demo and showed it to Abbott, who then introduced it to Dooma, a partner studio. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s CFO and narrative director, entered the gaming world after a career as a film producer and screenwriter.
In the early 2000s he founded Sekretagent Productions, providing narrative work for titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins. Later he built several tech ventures, including the cannabis formulation company Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million. After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, planning a quiet retirement.
Yet a call from his old Hollywood‑hillroommate Michael Abbott pulled him back: "Joe’s demo blew my mind and convinced me to come out of retirement." Wendschuh then recruited Reid Schneider, a former Warner Bros. Games VP now heading Raccoon Logic, as a strategic advisor, and hired Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, formerly of Ubisoft Montreal, as chief technology officer. With the core leadership in place, the studio turned to fundraising during a market downturn in 2023.
Initial pitches generated interest but not capital; after signing with CAA in Los Angeles and re‑pitching in 2024, Wolf Haus closed a seed round with Krafton and Lifelike Capital. The partnership with CAA—representing titles such as 007: First Light—proved valuable, as did the involvement of seasoned industry veterans. "My agent Derek Douglas, who helped me for twelve years in games, also heads the video‑game department at William Morris," Wendschuh notes.
Despite the pedigree, Join Us is being built by only thirteen full‑time staff members. Dietsch emphasizes that the small‑team model was intentional: "We wanted everyone to have a voice, to touch the creative process, and to feel ownership of the final product." To make such an ambitious project feasible with limited manpower, the studio invested heavily in custom tooling from the outset. "Any system in the game must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch says. The first year of development was split between ideating gameplay and constructing the internal tools that would later allow the open‑world map to expand without collapsing under its own weight.
Funding from Krafton and Lifelike was structured as equity, meaning the money was used directly to finance development rather than external loans. "The investors want the studio to increase its enterprise value, so they support our tool‑building ethos," Wendschuh explains. "When we encounter a problem we can’t solve, we build a tool for it.
It may slow us down in the short term, but it enables a tiny team to deliver a AAA‑level experience." When asked about generative AI, Dietsch is unequivocal: the studio does not employ it for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential. Using AI to generate assets would defeat the purpose of why we love making games," he says.
Wendschuh adds that the only AI usage is administrative, such as calendar scheduling and email drafting. Interestingly, Krafton, which has marketed itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required that Wolf Haus refrain from using generative AI in its creative pipeline. This mirrors statements from Neon Giant, another Krafton‑owned studio, which also denied AI involvement. The team’s commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s six‑kilometre‑square map and its 15,000 voice lines, all recorded by human actors.
"Even as a small indie, we felt it was crucial to keep everything hand‑made," Dietsch asserts. Dietsch reflects on the contrast between film and games: "In film, an idea can take years to reach the set, and you need permission from many gatekeepers. In games, you can prototype an idea in the morning, drop it into the engine, and see it instantly.
That immediacy is exhilarating." Wendschuh agrees, noting that filmmaking is front‑loaded with high‑stakes pre‑production and reliance on a handful of A‑list talent to secure financing. By contrast, the game industry has fewer gatekeepers, allowing a modest team to achieve success without marquee names.
"You don’t need a Hollywood star or director to make a hit game," he says. Both men acknowledge that their creative drive traces back to childhood. "At six, I wanted to make either movies or games; it boiled down to a coin toss and a Christmas camera," Dietsch recalls.
He learned programming on a TI‑83 calculator, merging his love for storytelling and interactivity. Ultimately, whether through film or interactive media, the goal remains the same: to craft an experience, tell a story, and engage an audience.