The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous co‑op cult simulator. Robed followers charge on pigs, wield machine guns, and the sequence culminates with a massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacle. One element that didn’t make the final cut was the infamous snake gun, a feature that Joe Dietsch, the studio’s CEO and creative director, proudly attributes to a spontaneous idea from a team member’s child.
"His son asked, ‘What if there’s a snake gun?’" Dietsch recalls. "Because we built a highly flexible weapon system, I could prototype a snake‑shooting gun in about thirty minutes.
The kid was thrilled, and the weapon stayed in the game." This anecdote encapsulates the chaotic, improvisational spirit that defines Join Us, an open‑world sandbox survival title where players can recruit followers—or friends in co‑op mode—to a 1970s‑style cult. It also illustrates why Wolf Haus leans heavily on custom tooling: the studio has managed to produce a high‑fidelity, content‑rich experience with a roster of only a dozen full‑time developers. Michael Abbott, the company’s chief operating officer, summed up their philosophy: "We set out to be disruptors.
While everyone assumed a project of this scope required a hundred‑person team, we argued we could achieve it with twelve." The claim seemed impossible to many, but the founders drew confidence from their backgrounds in indie filmmaking, where small budgets often demand outsized creativity. After 80 pitches, Wolf Haus finally secured equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, allowing the studio to retain control while financing development. The founding trio brings deep Hollywood connections.
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, the production company founded by Chris Roberts before his shift to Star Citizen.
Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. These cinematic roots inform the game’s narrative tone and visual flair. Join Us originated from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "Unreal was free to download, and I’d always loved games but felt blocked by the high entry barrier for creation," he explains.
He taught himself through YouTube tutorials, built a few modest prototypes, and eventually settled on a doomsday cult simulator that merged survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics. The proof‑of‑concept was shown to Abbott, who then introduced it to Dooma, a partner studio. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s CFO and narrative director, arrived from a career that spanned film production, screenwriting, and video‑game narrative work. He founded Sekretagent Productions, supplying writing for titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins.
Later, he launched several tech ventures, most notably the cannabis formulation company Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million. After a brief retirement on a remote Canadian island, a call from his old Hollywood‑hill roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back into game development. Impressed by Dietsch’s demo, Wendschuh recruited former Warner Bros.
Games VP Reid Schneider as a strategic advisor and brought in Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, ex‑Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer. Funding proved challenging amid a market downturn in 2023.
The team’s early pitches generated interest but no commitments. After partnering with CAA in Los Angeles and re‑pitching in 2024, they finally closed a seed round with Krafton and Lifelike Capital. Wendschuh credits the CAA relationship—alongside veteran advisors like Schneider and Chartrand—for opening doors that might otherwise have remained closed. Despite the high ambitions, the studio has remained lean, employing only 13 full‑time staff.
Dietsch emphasizes that the small size is intentional: "We wanted every voice to be heard, every person to touch the creative process, and the final product to feel like the work of a tightly knit group." To make such a scope feasible, the first year of development was split between game design and tool creation. "Any system we build must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch notes. By investing heavily in reusable tools early, the team ensured that as the open‑world map expanded, the engine wouldn’t buckle under its own weight. The equity‑funded model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools.
"Krafton and Lifelike’s investment finances the game directly, making it essentially self‑funded," says Wendschuh. This structure aligns investor incentives with the studio’s long‑term value creation, encouraging the continued development of in‑house tooling even when it slows short‑term progress.
When asked about generative AI, the team’s response is unequivocal: they do not employ it for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential for games," Dietsch asserts.
"Using AI to generate assets would defeat the purpose of why we get up each morning." Wendschuh adds that while the studio may use AI for administrative tasks like calendar management, it plays no role in design, art, or narrative. Interestingly, Krafton, which has branded itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in its creative pipeline, mirroring a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant. The commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s world and audio.
The six‑kilometre‑square map is entirely hand‑built, and the 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors, not synthetic voices. Dietsch argues that this level of artisanal effort is crucial even for a modest indie title. Comparing film and games, Dietsch highlights the immediacy of interactive media.
In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring approvals, casting, and massive budgets before a director ever sees a shot. In contrast, a game concept can be prototyped in a single morning, placed into the engine, and instantly visualised. Wendschuh points out that film production is front‑loaded with gate‑keeping—securing A‑list talent and studio backing—whereas game development faces fewer barriers, allowing smaller teams to achieve commercial success without marquee names.
Both mediums, however, share a core creative drive: storytelling and immersive experience. Dietsch reflects on his childhood fascination with both cameras and computers, noting that whether one makes movies or games, the ultimate goal is to engage an audience and tell a compelling story. This philosophy underpins Join Us, a game that blends cinematic horror, dark humor, and sandbox freedom—all built by a dozen passionate developers who chose tools and teamwork over shortcuts like generative AI.