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 pig‑back, unleash a barrage of machine‑gun fire, and the sequence culminates with an image of massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacles looming on the horizon. 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 now‑infamous snake‑gun. "One of the developers’ kids suggested, ‘What if there was a gun that shot snakes?’" Dietsch recalls.
"Because we built a modular weapon system that can be scaled in minutes, I was able to prototype a snake‑shooter in roughly half an hour. The kid went nuts, and we kept the weapon 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 invite friends in co‑op mode—to join a 1970s‑style doomsday cult. It also illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has enabled a high‑fidelity, large‑scale experience to be produced by a surprisingly small crew. Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, sums it up succinctly: “We set out to be disruptors.” "We told everyone, ‘We don’t need a hundred‑person studio; twelve people can do this.’" Most industry veterans scoffed, assuming the claim was impossible.
Yet the Wolf Haus team had already proven they could punch well above their weight in the indie film world, where limited budgets are the norm. After 80 pitches, they finally secured equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in the studio.
The founders’ Hollywood pedigree runs deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University in California alongside Louie Gibson—son of Mel Gibson and fellow Wolf Haus co‑founder—and the two co‑wrote and co‑directed the indie features Happy Hunting and Manifest West. Abbott, meanwhile, is the son of veteran makeup artist Larry Abbott and helped launch Ascendant Pictures, the production company founded by Chris Roberts before his transition to the Star Citizen universe.
Abbott later produced 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 tinkering after watching YouTube tutorials," he explains. Though he had no formal training, he managed to assemble a few modest games before deciding to tackle something larger.
The seed of the concept was a “doomsday cult simulator” that fused his love of survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema, creating a single intellectual property that could live in both film and games. He built a proof‑of‑concept prototype, expecting to hit a technical wall at some point. When he showed the demo to Abbott, the latter recognized its potential and presented it to Dooma, a partner studio. 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, contributing writing to 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 (US$330 million). After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire and enjoy a quiet life. Yet a sudden call from his old Hollywood Hills roommate, Michael Abbott, pulled him back into development.
"I watched the demo Joe sent me and it blew my mind," Wendschuh says, prompting him to exit retirement and join the project. He then recruited Reid Schneider—former VP at Warner Bros. Games and now head of Raccoon Logic, the studio behind Journey to the Savage Planet—as a strategic advisor, and brought in Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer.
With the core team in place, the next hurdle was financing, which proved difficult amid a broader industry downturn. The studio began pitching in summer 2023, initially receiving polite interest but little commitment. After signing with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles, they relaunched their pitch campaign in 2024 and finally closed a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton.
Wendschuh credits CAA’s network—particularly agents who also represent titles like 007: First Light—and the presence of seasoned veterans like Schneider and Chartrand for opening doors. Despite the heavyweight backing, Wolf Haus remains a lean operation of just 13 full‑time staff.
Dietsch emphasizes that the small size is intentional: “We wanted a studio where everyone has a voice, where every team member can touch the creative core, and where the final product truly feels like the work of a tight‑knit group.” To make an ambitious open‑world title feasible with such 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 notes. "We spent the first year simultaneously designing gameplay and building the internal tools that would let that gameplay scale across a massive map without collapsing under its own weight." The equity funding model gave the team the runway to perfect these tools.
Krafton and Lifelike’s investments were used to self‑fund development, with only a modest amount of project finance earmarked for marketing. "Our investors are aligned with us because they benefit from the studio’s increased enterprise value," says Wendschuh. "That alignment encourages us to keep building tools whenever we encounter a problem we can’t solve out‑of‑the‑box. It may slow us down in the short term, but it enables a tiny team to deliver a game of this scope." When asked about the role of generative AI—a hot topic in game development—Dietsch is unequivocal: the studio does not employ AI for creative tasks.
"We believe a human touch is essential. Hand‑crafting experiences is why we get up in the morning," he says. Wendschuh adds that the only AI tools they use are mundane productivity assistants for scheduling and email drafting. Interestingly, Krafton, which has publicly branded itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required that Wolf Haus not rely on generative AI for the game's creation.
This mirrors a similar stance taken by Neon Giant, another Krafton‑owned studio that distanced itself from the parent’s AI pivot. The team’s commitment to human‑generated 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 real actors, not synthetic voices. Dietsch believes this authenticity is crucial, even for an indie title. Transitioning from film to games, Dietsch appreciates the immediacy games provide. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring countless approvals and the coordination of high‑profile talent.
In contrast, a game concept can be prototyped in a single morning, inserted into the engine, and instantly visualised. Wendschuh points out that film production is heavily front‑loaded, with intense, short‑term bursts of activity on set, whereas games allow for more iterative, continuous development once the core systems are in place. Both mediums share a common creative impulse: storytelling and immersive experience. Dietsch reflects on his childhood, noting that whether he received a camera or a programming calculator for Christmas, the goal was always to craft narratives that engage an audience.
"Whether you’re making a movie or a game, you’re trying to give someone an experience, tell them a story, and draw them in," he says, underscoring the timeless nature of the craft regardless of the platform.