The trailer for Join Us first appeared during the Xbox Showcase in June, offering a glimpse of a darkly humorous cooperative cult‑simulation. In the clip, robed followers zip around on pigs, wielding machine guns, before the screen fades to a monstrous, Cthulhu‑like tangle of tentacles. One element that didn’t make the final cut was the infamous "snake gun," a weapon that originated from an off‑hand suggestion by a developer’s son.
Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, explains that the team had a rapid‑prototyping tool that let them turn the whimsical idea into a functional weapon in roughly thirty minutes. The result remains in the game and exemplifies the kind of chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay Join Us promises. Join Us is an open‑world sandbox survival experience where players can recruit followers—or other players in co‑op mode—to build a 1970s‑style cult. The title’s design philosophy is deeply rooted in the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has enabled a small crew to produce a high‑fidelity, content‑rich game.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, says the team set out to be "disruptors" by proving that a dozen developers could deliver a product that would normally require a hundred. "Everyone told us it was impossible," Abbott recalls.
"But we came from indie‑film backgrounds where we constantly had to punch far above our weight, so we knew how to stretch a limited budget." After 80 pitches, the studio finally secured equity investment from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, giving the fledgling studio the financial runway it needed. The founders’ Hollywood pedigree runs deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of actor‑director 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, a production company founded by Chris Roberts before he turned his attention to Star Citizen. Abbott later produced films such as Fight for ’84, starring Jamie Foxx. Join Us began as a side project for Dietsch while he was tinkering with Unreal Engine. "Unreal Engine was free to download, and I’d always loved games but felt there was a huge barrier to actually creating something," he says.
He taught himself the engine through YouTube tutorials, eventually building a few modest prototypes. The idea that stuck with him was a doomsday cult simulator that blended survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics—a hybrid that could serve as a single intellectual property spanning both film and games. The proof‑of‑concept was rough but promising, and Dietsch showed it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, a partner studio. Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, had previously worked as a 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, most notably the cannabis‑formulation company Ebbu, which sold for 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. Impressed by the Join Us demo, Wendschuh helped bring in strategic advisor Reid Schneider—former Warner Bros. Games VP and now head of Raccoon Logic—and recruited former Ubisoft Montreal programmer Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand as chief technology officer.
Funding proved to be the next major hurdle. The team began pitching in the summer of 2023, a period marked by an industry downturn. Although the concept generated excitement, securing capital was difficult. After initial outreach, Wolf Haus signed with CAA in Los Angeles and resumed pitching in 2024, eventually closing a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton.
Wendschuh credits the CAA connection—alongside the credibility of veterans like Schneider and Chartrand—for opening doors. Despite the high‑profile backing, the studio remains lean, with only 13 full‑time staff members.
Dietsch emphasizes that the small size is intentional: "We wanted a setting where everyone has a voice, everyone can touch the creative process, and the game feels like a product of a tight‑knit group rather than a faceless corporation." To make such an ambitious open‑world title feasible, the team invested heavily in custom tooling early in development. "Any system in the game needs to be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch notes. The first year was split between ideating gameplay and building the internal tools that would keep the project from collapsing under its own weight. The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the breathing room to perfect those tools.
"Krafton and Lifelike are equity partners, and their investment has essentially self‑funded the game," explains Wendschuh. While the studio is now seeking modest project finance for marketing, the core development has been covered entirely by the investors. This arrangement aligns incentives: the investors benefit from the studio’s increased enterprise value, encouraging Wolf Haus to continue building robust tools rather than cutting corners. When asked about generative AI, the team is unequivocal: they do not rely on it for any creative work.
"We believe a game needs a human touch," Dietsch says. "Using an AI to generate assets would defeat the purpose of why we get up every morning—to create something ourselves." Wendschuh adds that the studio only uses AI for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting. Interestingly, Krafton, which has branded itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in the creative pipeline, mirroring similar stances taken by other Krafton‑owned studios such as Neon Giant. The commitment to handcrafted content extends to the game’s world and audio.
The six‑kilometre‑square map was built manually, and all 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors—an effort the team deemed essential, even for a modest indie title. Dietsch finds the immediacy of game development especially rewarding compared to film.
In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring countless approvals and the involvement of high‑profile talent to secure studio backing. By contrast, a game concept can be prototyped within hours, allowing creators to see their vision in action almost instantly. Wendschuh observes that film production is heavily front‑loaded, with intense pre‑production phases focused on securing A‑list directors or actors.
While anyone can technically shoot a backyard movie, breaking through without star power or distribution is rare. Games, on the other hand, have far fewer gatekeepers; a small team can reach a global audience without needing celebrity endorsement. Both founders agree that the core creative impulse—telling stories and delivering experiences—remains the same across mediums. "When I was six, I wanted to make either games or movies; it boiled down to a coin toss and maybe getting a camera for Christmas," Dietsch reflects.
"Whether you’re crafting a film or a game, you’re trying to engage an audience, tell a story, and create an experience. The tools change, but the goal stays the same."