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 pigs, unleash a barrage of machine‑gun fire, and the sequence culminates with an image of massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacles looming in the distance. What the audience didn’t see was the infamous "snake gun"—a quirky weapon that has become a hallmark of the game. According to Joe Dietsch, the studio’s CEO and creative director, the idea originated from a junior team member’s child who asked, “Can there be a snake gun?” Leveraging an internal tool that lets the team prototype weapons in a matter of minutes, Dietsch built a functional snake‑shooting firearm in roughly half an hour.
The result impressed the youngster so much that the weapon stayed in the final build. That anecdote captures the spirit of Join Us: a sprawling, open‑world sandbox survival experience where players can recruit followers—or invite friends in co‑op mode—to join a 1970s‑style cult. The game’s chaotic, over‑the‑top design is matched by the studio’s equally unconventional development philosophy.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, describes the team’s ambition as “disruptive.” He and his colleagues believed they could deliver a high‑fidelity, large‑scale title with only a dozen developers, a claim that many industry veterans dismissed as impossible. Their confidence, however, was rooted in a history of doing more with less. "We come from indie film backgrounds, where you learn to punch well above your weight," Abbott explains.
After 80 pitch meetings, the studio finally secured equity financing from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in Wolf Haus. The founding trio brings deep Hollywood connections to the table.
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 he turned his attention to Star Citizen.
Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84, starring Jamie Foxx. These film‑industry roots inform the studio’s narrative sensibility and its comfort with high‑concept, visually striking projects. Join Us began as a personal experiment in Unreal Engine.
"I discovered that Unreal Engine could be downloaded for free, and that felt like a door opening," Dietsch recounts. He had long been a gamer and film enthusiast, but the perceived barrier to creating his own interactive experiences kept him from diving in. After teaching himself the basics through YouTube tutorials, he built a handful of small prototypes.
The concept that kept resurfacing was a doomsday cult simulator—a mash‑up of survival mechanics, grindhouse cinema aesthetics, and the kind of storytelling he loved in both movies and games. He crafted a proof‑of‑concept demo, showing it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, a partner studio. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s chief financial officer and narrative director, entered the picture after a varied career that spanned film production, screenwriting, and video‑game writing.
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 roughly C$430 million (about $330 million USD). After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire and enjoy a quiet life. That plan was interrupted when an old Hollywood‑hill roommate, Michael Abbott, called to share a video‑game prototype created by Joe Dietsch.
The demo “blew his mind,” prompting Wendschuh to come out of retirement and join the effort. Wendschuh recruited Reid Schneider—formerly a vice‑president at Warner Bros. Games and now head of Raccoon Logic, the studio behind Journey to the Savage Planet—to act as a strategic advisor. Schneider, in turn, brought on Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer.
With this core team in place, the next hurdle was financing, which proved difficult amid a broader industry downturn in 2023. Initial pitches generated interest but no commitments. After aligning with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles and returning to the pitch circuit in 2024, Wolf Haus finally closed a seed round with Krafton and Lifelike Capital. The partnership with CAA—whose roster includes titles like 007: First Light—proved crucial, as did the presence of seasoned veterans like Schneider and Chartrand.
"Derek Douglas, our agent at CAA, had represented me for twelve years in the gaming world and previously led the video‑game department at William Morris," Wendschuh notes, underscoring how industry relationships smoothed the funding path. What truly sets Join Us apart is the way it is being built: a full‑scale, open‑world experience created by just 13 full‑time staff members. Dietsch emphasizes that the team entered the project with a clear understanding of its scope and a desire to preserve a small‑team culture where every voice matters. To make such an ambitious undertaking feasible, 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 explains. By constructing a robust internal toolkit early, the team ensured that as features proliferated across the six‑kilometre‑square map, the project would not collapse under its own weight.
In practice, this meant that the first year of development was split between ideating gameplay concepts and building the software infrastructure that would support them—an approach that also lays the groundwork for future Wolf Haus projects. Funding from Krafton and Lifelike has allowed the studio to self‑finance the entire development cycle, with only a modest amount of project finance earmarked for marketing. Because the investors hold equity, they share the studio’s long‑term goal of increasing enterprise value, which aligns with Wolf Haus’s commitment to tool‑building. "Whenever we encounter a problem we can’t solve, we simply create a tool to address it," says Wendschuh.
This method may slow short‑term progress, but it empowers a tiny team to deliver a product that would normally require many more hands. When the conversation turns to generative AI—a hot topic in game development—Wolf Haus draws a clear line. "We don’t use generative AI for any creative work," Dietsch states firmly.
The studio believes that a human touch is essential to the artistic process. "We love making games, and handing the creative work over to an algorithm would defeat the purpose of why we get up in the morning," he adds.
Wendschuh concedes that the team uses AI tools for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting, but none of those tools influence the game’s design, narrative, or art. Interestingly, Krafton, which has branded itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required that Wolf Haus avoid generative AI in its creative pipeline, mirroring a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant. The studio’s dedication to handcrafted content extends to the game’s massive map and voice work. The entire six‑kilometre‑square world was built by hand, and the 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors—an effort that the team considers vital, even for an indie‑scale title.
Dietsch contrasts the immediacy of game development with the protracted timelines of film. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring multiple approvals and the involvement of high‑profile talent.
In games, an idea can be prototyped within hours, allowing developers to see their vision instantly in the engine. This rapid iteration, he argues, lowers the barriers to entry and reduces reliance on star power.
Wendschuh adds that while film production is front‑loaded with intense, high‑stakes set work and the need for marquee names to secure studio backing, game development offers a more democratic pathway. "Anyone could technically make a movie with a backyard camera, but without big names or distribution it’s unlikely to succeed.
By contrast, a game can reach a wide audience without needing an A‑list actor or director," he explains. Both founders reflect on how their early passions—gaming and filmmaking—have always been about storytelling and creating experiences. "When I was six, I wanted to make either games or movies; it came down to a coin toss and whether I got a camera for Christmas," Dietsch recalls. He taught himself programming on a TI‑83 calculator, laying the foundation for a career that now blends cinematic flair with interactive design.
The result is Join Us: a wildly original, tool‑driven, handcrafted cult simulator that proves a small, focused team can deliver a large‑scale, high‑quality game without leaning on generative AI.