You may remember seeing the Join Us trailer during the Xbox Showcase in June. The clip introduced a darkly humorous co‑op cult simulator where cloaked followers zip around on pigs, fire machine guns, and culminate in a showdown with Cthulhu‑like tentacles. What didn’t make the final cut was the infamous snake gun, a weapon that, according to Wolf Haus Games’ CEO and creative director Joe Dietsch, was born from a kid’s off‑hand suggestion. "One of the team members’ sons asked, ‘What if there’s a snake‑gun?’ We had a modular gun system that let us prototype something in half an hour.
I built a snake‑shooting weapon on the fly, and the kid went nuts. It’s still in the game," Dietsch recalls. That anecdote captures the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises: an open‑world sandbox survival experience where players can recruit AI followers or friends into a 1970s‑style cult. It also highlights the studio’s tech‑first mindset, which has allowed a small group of developers 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 could build a AAA‑ish game with just twelve people. Most people laughed at us." The team’s confidence stems from a background in low‑budget, high‑impact indie filmmaking. "We come from indie film, so we’re used to punching far above our weight," Abbott explains.
After 80 pitches, the studio finally secured equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in Wolf Haus. The founders’ Hollywood connections run deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of Mel Gibson, who later 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, the production house founded by Chris Roberts before his Star Citizen venture.
He later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us originated when Dietsch began tinkering with Unreal Engine. "Unreal was free to download, and I’d always loved games, but the barrier to actually create something felt huge.
I started learning from YouTube tutorials and built a few tiny prototypes," he says. Although he had no formal game‑dev experience, Dietsch soon crafted a modest demo that sparked the concept of a doomsday cult simulator—a mash‑up of survival mechanics and grindhouse cinema that merged his film and gaming passions. He built a proof‑of‑concept, expecting to hit a technical wall at some point.
When he showed the demo to Abbott, the latter took it to Dooma, a production partner. Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, began his career as a film producer and screenwriter before moving into games in the early 2000s, providing writing for 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 company Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million. After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, planning to retire.
But a call from his old Hollywood Hills roommate, Michael Abbott, pulled him back. "Joe sent me a video of his game, and it blew my mind. I came out of retirement to help," Wendschuh recalls.
He introduced the project to Reid Schneider, former Warner Bros. Games VP and now head of Raccoon Logic, who became a strategic advisor and recruited Ubisoft Montreal veteran Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand as chief technology officer.
With the core team in place, funding became the next hurdle. Pitching began in summer 2023, during an industry downturn. "People liked what we were doing but the market was tight," Dietsch notes.
After partnering with CAA in Los Angeles and re‑pitching in 2024, Wolf Haus secured a seed round from Lifelike Capital and Krafton. Wendschuh attributes part of the success to CAA’s influence and the credibility added by veterans like Schneider and Chartrand. Despite the high ambitions, the studio remains lean—13 full‑time staff members. "We entered the project with a clear scope and wanted a small‑team culture where everyone’s voice matters and everyone touches the creative side," says Dietsch.
To make such a scope feasible, the studio invested heavily in custom tooling early on. "Every system must be scalable and debuggable by a single person. We built a toolkit that lets us expand features across a massive open world without the project collapsing," he explains. The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools.
"Krafton and Lifelike’s investment financed the entire development. We’re now adding a bit of project finance for marketing, but the core game was built with their equity," Wendschuh says. The investors’ alignment with the studio’s long‑term value creation encouraged the tool‑building ethos: whenever a problem arose, the team built a bespoke solution, even if it slowed short‑term progress.
When asked about generative AI, Dietsch gives a firm “no.” "We believe a game needs a human touch. Handing creative decisions to an AI would defeat why we get up each morning," he states. Wendschuh adds that the studio only uses AI for mundane tasks like calendar management, not for any artistic work. Interestingly, Krafton—publicly branding itself as an “AI‑first” company—insisted that Wolf Haus avoid generative AI in its creative pipeline, mirroring a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant.
The commitment to handcrafted content is evident: the six‑kilometre‑square map is entirely hand‑built, and the game features roughly 15,000 voice lines recorded by human actors. "Even as a tiny indie, we felt it was crucial to keep the human element," says Dietsch. Dietsch also reflects on the contrast between film and games. In film, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring approvals, big‑name talent, and studio green‑lights.
In games, an inspiration can be prototyped the same day in the engine, offering immediate feedback. "You can have an idea at breakfast and see it in the engine by lunch," he says. Wendschuh notes that while film production is front‑loaded with high‑stakes negotiations for star talent, game development faces fewer gatekeepers—no need for an A‑list director or actor to succeed.
Both mediums, however, share a core creative impulse: storytelling and immersive experience. "When I was six, I wanted to make movies or games. It came down to a coin toss and a Christmas camera. I learned programming on a TI‑83, so I’ve always been a hybrid," Dietsch muses.
He believes that whether you’re crafting a film or a video game, the goal remains the same—to deliver a compelling narrative and engage the audience.