The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous co‑op cult simulator where robed followers zip around on pigs, fire machine guns, and ultimately confront massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacles. One detail that didn’t make the final cut was the infamous “snake gun,” a quirky weapon that Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, says was born from a child’s imagination.
According to Dietsch, a team member’s son asked, “Can there be a snake gun?” Thanks to an in‑house tool that lets the developers prototype firearms in minutes, Dietsch was able to code a snake‑shooting weapon in roughly half an hour. The result was a jaw‑dropping moment for the kid and a permanent, oddball addition to the game. This anecdote captures the chaotic, improvisational spirit that defines Join Us, an open‑world sandbox survival title where players can recruit AI followers or friends into a 1970s‑style cult.
It also illustrates why the studio’s technology‑first mindset matters: it lets a tiny crew deliver a high‑fidelity experience that would normally require a much larger team. Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, summed up the ambition: “We wanted to be disruptors.
We told ourselves we could build a AAA‑level game with twelve people, and everyone else said it was impossible.” Their confidence stems from a background in indie filmmaking, where they learned to “punch above their weight” on shoestring budgets. After 80 pitches, the studio finally secured equity investment from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, giving the project the financial backing it needed without diluting its creative control. The founders’ Hollywood pedigree runs deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of Mel Gibson, who now co‑heads Wolf Haus.
Together they co‑wrote and co‑directed two low‑budget movies, Happy Hunting and Manifest West. Abbott is the son of renowned makeup artist Larry Abbott and helped launch Ascendant Pictures, the production company founded by Chris Roberts before he moved on to Star Citizen. Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx.
These connections provided both a storytelling sensibility and a willingness to experiment that translates directly into their game design. Join Us began as a personal experiment in Unreal Engine. “Unreal was free to download, and I’d been a gamer my whole life,” Dietsch explains.
“I felt there was a huge barrier to actually creating something, so I started learning from YouTube tutorials and built a few tiny prototypes.” After several small projects, the idea of a doomsday cult simulator kept resurfacing because it blended his love for survival mechanics, grindhouse cinema, and narrative depth. He built a proof‑of‑concept demo, hit a wall, and showed it to Abbott, who then introduced the project to Dooma, a production partner.
Dooma Wendschuh, the studio’s CFO and narrative director, originally made his name as a producer and screenwriter before moving into games in the early 2000s. He founded Sekretagent Productions, providing writing services for titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins.
Later he launched several tech ventures, including 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 roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back into the industry. Wendschuh was instantly impressed by Dietsch’s demo and agreed to help, eventually bringing on Reid Schneider—former Warner Bros. Games VP—and Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, an ex‑Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as strategic advisors and technical leads.
Securing funding proved challenging amid a market downturn. The team began pitching in the summer of 2023, receiving polite interest but little commitment. After partnering with CAA in Los Angeles and refining their pitch, they finally closed a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton in 2024.
Wendschuh believes the CAA connection—whose roster includes titles like 007: First Light—was pivotal, as were the veteran advisors who could vouch for the studio’s credibility. Despite the high ambitions, the studio remains lean: only 13 full‑time staff members.
Dietsch emphasizes that a small, tight‑knit team allows everyone to have a voice and directly shape the creative direction. To make a large‑scale open world feasible, the studio invested heavily in custom tools early on. “If a system can’t be scaled or debugged by a single person, it becomes a bottleneck,” he says.
The first year of development was therefore 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 without the pressure of short‑term milestones. Krafton and Lifelike’s capital financed the entire development, with only a modest amount of project finance earmarked for marketing. This arrangement aligns investor incentives with the studio’s long‑term value creation, encouraging the continued development of in‑house solutions even when they slow down immediate progress.
When asked about generative AI, the team is unequivocal: they do not rely on it for creative work. “We believe a human touch is essential,” says Dietsch.
“Using AI to generate assets would defeat the reason we get up every morning—to create something ourselves.” Wendschuh adds that the studio only uses AI for administrative tasks like calendar management and email drafting. Interestingly, Krafton, which has publicly branded itself as an “AI‑first” company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid AI‑generated content as a condition of its investment, mirroring a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant.
The commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s massive six‑kilometre‑square map and its 15,000 voice lines, all recorded by human actors. Dietsch argues that this level of manual craftsmanship is rare even among indie titles and reflects the studio’s dedication to authenticity. Comparing film and games, Dietsch notes the immediacy of the latter. In cinema, a concept can sit on paper for years before it ever sees a set, whereas in game development an idea can be prototyped in a matter of hours and instantly visualized in the engine.
Wendschuh points out that film production is heavily front‑loaded, requiring high‑profile talent and studio approval before a project even begins. By contrast, the game industry has fewer gatekeepers; a small team can release a polished product without A‑list actors or directors, dramatically lowering the barrier to entry.
Both mediums, however, share a core creative drive: telling stories and delivering experiences that resonate with audiences. Dietsch reflects on his childhood, recalling a coin toss that could have sent him down either the film or game path. “Whether you’re making a movie or a game, you’re trying to give someone an experience, tell a story, and engage them,” he says, underscoring the universal nature of storytelling across platforms. In summary, Wolf Haus’s journey—from Hollywood film roots and a lucrative cannabis exit to a tightly‑run, tool‑centric game studio—demonstrates how a small, motivated team can defy industry expectations.
By refusing to lean on generative AI, investing heavily in bespoke technology, and leveraging deep entertainment industry connections, they have crafted a unique cult‑simulator that promises both chaotic fun and meticulous craftsmanship. The result is Join Us, a game that blends dark humor, open‑world freedom, and a distinctly human touch, all built by a dozen passionate creators.