The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous cooperative cult‑simulation where robed followers zip around on pigs, fire machine guns, and eventually confront colossal Cthulhu‑like tentacles. One element that didn’t make the final cut of the teaser was the infamous snake gun, a quirky weapon that CEO and creative director Joe Dietsch of Wolf Haus Games proudly attributes to a child’s imagination. "One of the team members’ kids asked, ‘What would a snake‑shooting gun look like?’ We had a rapid‑prototyping tool for weapons, so within about thirty minutes I built a gun that launched snakes. The kid went nuts, and the weapon stayed in the game," Dietsch recalls.
That anecdote encapsulates the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises: an open‑world sandbox survival experience where players can recruit followers—or invite friends in co‑op mode—to join a 1970s‑style cult. It also highlights 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.
"We set out to be disruptors," says Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer. "We told everyone, ‘We don’t need a hundred‑person team; twelve talented people can do this.’ Most people laughed and called us crazy." Abbott and his colleagues, however, are no strangers to punching above their weight.
Their backgrounds lie in independent filmmaking, where lean budgets and creative ingenuity are the norm. "We come from indie film circles and are used to doing big things with limited resources," 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 in California alongside Louie Gibson—son of actor‑director 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, a production company originally founded by Chris Roberts before his shift to Star Citizen. Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us emerged from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "I discovered Unreal was free to download and started tinkering after watching YouTube tutorials," he says.
Though he had no formal training, he built a few small games before deciding to tackle something larger. The concept of a doomsday cult simulator kept resurfacing because it merged his love of survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema, creating a unique intellectual property that straddles both film and gaming. 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 took it to Dooma, a partner studio.
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, 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.
After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire. Yet, in classic Hollywood fashion, a call from his old roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back. "I was ready to relax, but when Joe showed me his game, it blew my mind and got me out of retirement," Wendschuh recounts.
He introduced the project to Reid Schneider, former VP at Warner Bros Games and now head of Raccoon Logic (makers of Journey to the Savage Planet), who became a strategic advisor. Schneider recruited Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer.
With the core team assembled, the next hurdle was financing—a daunting task amid an industry downturn that began in 2023. Initial pitches generated interest but not commitment. The studio eventually partnered with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles, refined its pitch, and returned to investors in 2024, securing a seed round from Lifelike Capital and Krafton. Wendschuh believes CAA’s representation, which also covers titles like 007: First Light, and the presence of seasoned game veterans were crucial.
"My agent at CAA, Derek Douglas, had represented me during my twelve years in games and previously headed the video‑game department at William Morris," he notes. Despite the high‑profile backing, Join Us is being built by only 13 full‑time staff members. Dietsch emphasizes that the small‑team philosophy ensures everyone has a voice and can directly influence the creative direction.
To make such an ambitious project feasible, the studio invested heavily in custom tooling from the outset. "Any system in the game must be scalable and debuggable by a single developer," Dietsch explains.
"We spent the first year simultaneously designing gameplay and building the internal tools that would let that gameplay scale across a massive open world without collapsing under its own weight." The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools. "Krafton and Lifelike’s capital funded the entire development; we’re essentially self‑funded for the core game," says Wendschuh. "We’re now using a modest amount of project finance for marketing, but the game itself was built entirely on their investment." One of the advantages of equity backing is that investors share the studio’s long‑term goal of increasing enterprise value, which aligns with Wolf Haus’s tool‑centric ethos.
When the team encounters a problem they can’t solve with existing assets, they simply build a new tool, even if it slows immediate progress. This approach enables a tiny team to deliver a product that would normally require dozens of engineers.
When asked about generative AI—a hot topic in game development—Dietsch gives a clear answer: the studio does not employ it for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential. Using AI to generate core content would defeat the purpose of why we love making games," he says.
Wendschuh adds that while they may use AI for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting, it never touches the artistic side of development. Even Krafton, which publicly branded itself as an "AI‑first" company last year, insisted that Wolf Haus avoid generative AI in the creative pipeline. "Our investors wanted assurance that the studio wasn’t relying on AI to produce the game," Wendschuh notes, echoing similar statements from Krafton‑owned Neon Giant. The team’s 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. "That was non‑negotiable for us, even as a small indie studio," Wendschuh affirms. Dietsch reflects on the contrast between filmmaking and game development. In film, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring approvals, casting, and studio greenlights.
In games, an idea can be prototyped the same day and tested instantly in the engine. "You can have a concept in the morning, drop it into the engine, and see it in action within hours.
That immediacy is exhilarating," he says. Wendschuh observes that movies are heavily front‑loaded: securing a few high‑profile directors or actors is often the gatekeeper to getting a project funded. While anyone can technically shoot a movie with a backyard camera, breaking through without marquee names or distribution is rare. Games, by contrast, have far fewer gatekeepers; a small team can reach a global audience without A‑list talent.
"We don’t need a Hollywood star to sell a game," he explains. Both mediums, however, share a core creative drive: storytelling and delivering an experience. Dietsch’s childhood ambition was split between making movies and games, a decision that ultimately hinged on a Christmas gift—a camera. He taught himself programming on a TI‑83 calculator, laying the foundation for a career that now blends cinematic flair with interactive design.
"Whether it’s a film or a game, the goal is to tell a story, engage the audience, and give them an experience," he concludes.