The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous co‑op cult simulator. In the clip, robed followers charge on pig‑back, brandishing machine guns, before the screen fades to an eldritch mass of Cthulhu‑like tentacles. One detail that didn’t make the final edit was the infamous "snake gun," a weapon that originated from a simple suggestion by a team member’s child. Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, recounts how his son’s off‑hand question – “Can there be a snake gun?” – sparked a rapid prototype.
Using an in‑house scaling tool, Dietsch built a functional snake‑shooting weapon in roughly thirty minutes, delighting the youngster and cementing the quirky weapon in the final product. That anecdote captures the chaotic, improvisational spirit at the heart of Join Us, an open‑world sandbox survival game where players can recruit followers or invite friends into a 1970s‑style cult. It also illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has enabled a small team to produce a high‑fidelity title that would normally require a much larger staff.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, summed up their ambition: “We wanted to be disruptors. We told everyone we could build a AAA‑level experience with just twelve people, and most people thought we were insane.” The team’s confidence stems from a background in indie filmmaking, where they learned to “punch above their weight.” After 80 pitches, Wolf Haus finally secured equity financing from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in the studio. The founding members bring deep Hollywood connections.
Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of Mel Gibson, and the two 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 transition to Star Citizen. Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84, starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us was born 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 built a few small prototypes before deciding to tackle something larger: a doomsday cult simulator that merged survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics. He created a proof‑of‑concept demo, hit a technical wall, and presented it to Abbott, who then introduced it to Dooma. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s CFO and narrative director, began his career as a film producer and screenwriter before moving into games in the early 2000s.
He founded Sekretagent Productions, providing narrative services 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 C$430 million (approximately $330 million USD).
After the sale, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire. Yet a sudden call from his old Hollywood Hills roommate, Michael Abbott, pulled him back. Listening to a demo of Join Us, Wendschuh was “blown away” and decided to re‑enter the industry. Through Abbott’s network, Wendschuh connected with Reid Schneider, former VP at Warner Bros.
Games and now 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 this core in place, the studio turned to fundraising during a market downturn in 2023‑2024.
Despite the challenging climate, the team’s pitch, backed by CAA representation, eventually attracted seed investment from Lifelike Capital and Krafton. Wolf Haus’s lean structure—just 13 full‑time staff—was intentional.
Dietsch emphasizes that everyone on the team has a voice and touches every creative aspect, fostering a sense of ownership rarely found in larger studios. To make an ambitious open‑world game feasible with such a small crew, the studio invested heavily in custom tools early on. “If a system exists in the game, it must be scalable and debuggable by a single person,” Dietsch notes. The first year of development was split between ideating gameplay and building the underlying toolset, a strategy that also prepares the studio for future projects.
The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the runway to perfect these tools. Krafton and Lifelike’s capital financed the entire development, with only a modest amount of project finance earmarked for marketing. Because the investors hold equity, they are motivated to see the studio’s enterprise value rise, encouraging the team to continue building robust internal tools even when it slows short‑term progress.
When asked about generative AI, the studio’s stance is clear: they avoid it for creative work. “We believe a human touch is essential to game development,” says Dietsch. The only AI they employ is for administrative tasks like calendar management and email drafting.
Interestingly, Krafton, which has branded itself as an “AI‑first” company, explicitly discouraged Wolf Haus from using generative AI in the creative pipeline, aligning with the studio’s philosophy of preserving artistic integrity. All of Join Us’s assets reflect this hands‑on approach.
The six‑kilometre‑square map is handcrafted, and the game features 15,000 voice lines recorded by human actors, not synthetic voices. This commitment to craftsmanship extends to the studio’s broader view of media creation. Dietsch contrasts film and games, noting that movies often require years of pre‑production, securing high‑profile talent, and navigating studio gatekeepers before a single frame is shot. In contrast, a game idea can be prototyped within hours, allowing immediate iteration and creative freedom.
Wendschuh adds that while film production is front‑loaded with intense, high‑stakes set work, games benefit from a more distributed risk model. Anyone can rent a camera and shoot a backyard movie, but without star power or distribution deals, success is unlikely. Games, however, have far fewer gatekeepers; a small indie team can reach a global audience without A‑list actors or directors.
Both founders trace their passion back to childhood. Dietsch recalls wanting to make either movies or games at six years old, a decision that ultimately hinged on receiving a camera for Christmas.
He taught himself programming on a TI‑83 calculator, laying the groundwork for a career that now bridges cinema and interactive entertainment. He believes the core purpose remains the same across mediums: to tell stories, create experiences, and engage audiences. Join Us stands as a testament to what a tight‑knit, tech‑savvy team can achieve when they blend Hollywood storytelling sensibilities with indie‑game resourcefulness, all while rejecting the shortcut of generative AI in favor of authentic, human‑crafted content.