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 preview, robed followers ride on pigs, unleash machine‑gun fire, and the sequence culminates in a nightmarish vision of Cthulhu‑like tentacles. What didn’t make the cut, according to Joe Dietsch—CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games—was the infamous snake gun. "One of the developer’s kids suggested a snake‑shooting weapon," Dietsch recalls.
"We had a rapid‑prototyping tool that let us spin up a new gun in about thirty minutes, so I built a snake‑launcher on the fly. The kid went nuts, and the weapon stayed in the final build." That anecdote captures the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises: an open‑world sandbox where players can recruit followers—or teammates in co‑op mode—to a 1970s‑style cult and unleash absurdist violence across a sprawling map.
It also illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has allowed a tiny crew to produce a high‑fidelity title that would normally require a much larger staff. "We set out to be disruptors," says Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer. "We told everyone, ‘We don’t need a hundred people; twelve will do.’ Most people thought we were crazy," Abbott adds. "But we come from indie film backgrounds where we constantly punch far above our budget.
After 80 pitches we finally secured equity investment from Krafton and Lifelike Capital." The founding team’s Hollywood roots run deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, the son of Mel Gibson and another Wolf Haus co‑founder. Together they 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 he turned his attention to Star Citizen.
Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us began as a hobby project in Unreal Engine. "I discovered Unreal was free to download and started tinkering after watching YouTube tutorials," Dietsch explains.
"I’d loved games for years, but the barrier to actually building something felt huge. Unreal let me break that barrier." Even without formal training, Dietsch managed to ship a couple of small prototypes before committing to a larger vision. He kept returning to the idea of a doomsday cult simulator because it merged his love of survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics, creating a single intellectual property that bridges his two passions. He built a proof‑of‑concept and showed it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, the company that would later become a strategic 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. 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 launched several tech ventures, including the cannabis formulation firm Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million (US$330 million). After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire and enjoy a quiet life.
That plan was interrupted when an old Hollywood‑hill roommate, Michael Abbott, called and said, "A friend of mine has made a video game." Curious, Wendschuh watched the demo and was instantly hooked, prompting him to exit retirement and re‑enter the industry. He introduced the project to Reid Schneider, a former vice president at Warner Bros.
Games and current head of Raccoon Logic, the studio behind Journey to the Savage Planet. Schneider joined as a strategic advisor and recruited Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, to serve as chief technology officer. With the core leadership in place, the next hurdle was financing.
The team began pitching in the summer of 2023, a period marked by a broader industry downturn. "People liked what we were showing, but it was a tough market," Dietsch notes. The studio enlisted Creative Artists Agency (CAA) as representation and continued pitching throughout 2024.
Their persistence paid off when Lifelike Capital and Krafton closed a seed round, providing the capital needed to move forward. Wendschuh believes CAA’s connections—especially agents who also represent titles like 007: First Light—were instrumental, as were the veteran game industry figures on the advisory board. "Derek Douglas, our CAA agent, had been my agent during my twelve years making games and previously headed the video‑game department at William Morris," Wendschuh says. Despite the pedigree, Join Us is being built by only 13 full‑time staff members.
"We entered the project with a clear understanding of scope and a desire to keep the team small, so everyone has a voice and can touch every aspect of the creative process," Dietsch explains. To make such an ambitious title feasible with a lean crew, the studio invested heavily in custom tooling early on.
"Any system in the game must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," he says. "We spent the first year simultaneously designing gameplay and building the internal tools that let us expand without the project collapsing under its own weight." The funding structure reinforced this approach. Krafton and Lifelike took equity stakes, allowing the studio to self‑fund development while using a modest amount of project finance for marketing. "Equity partners want the studio to increase its enterprise value, so they encourage us to build robust tools," Wendschuh explains.
"When we hit a technical roadblock, we simply create a tool to solve it. It may slow short‑term progress, but it enables a tiny team to deliver a game of this scale." When asked about generative AI, the team’s response is unequivocal: they avoid it for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential. Turning development over to an AI would defeat the reason we get up each morning," Dietsch says.
Wendschuh adds that the only AI they employ is for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting, not for art, design, or writing. Krafton, despite branding itself as an “AI‑first” company, also discouraged the use of generative AI in Wolf Haus’s pipeline. "Our investors wanted assurance that the studio wasn’t relying on AI to produce the game," Wendschuh notes, echoing similar statements from Neon Giant, another Krafton‑owned studio. The studio’s commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s world and audio.
The six‑kilometre‑square map is entirely hand‑built, and all 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors—an effort the team deemed vital even for an indie‑scale project. Dietsch reflects on the contrast between film and games: "In film, you write a script, wait years for financing, then finally get on set. You need A‑list talent to greenlight a movie.
In games, you can prototype an idea in a morning, drop it into the engine, and see it instantly. There are far fewer gatekeepers, so a small team can achieve success without big‑name actors or directors." Both mediums, however, share a common creative drive: storytelling and immersion. "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 says.
"I learned to program on a TI‑83, so I’ve always loved both. Whether you’re making a film or a game, you’re delivering an experience, telling a story, and engaging an audience. The tools may differ, but the goal is the same."