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 charge on pigs while firing machine guns, culminating in a shot of massive, Cthulhu‑like tentacles. What didn’t make the edit was the infamous "snake gun," a quirky weapon that Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, says was inspired by a child’s off‑hand suggestion.
"One of the team members’ sons asked, ‘What if there was a snake‑shooting gun?’ We had a rapid‑prototyping tool that let us spin up a new weapon in about thirty minutes, so I built it on the fly. The kid went nuts, and the gun stayed in the final build," Dietsch recounts. This anecdote captures the chaotic, improvisational spirit that defines Join Us, an open‑world sandbox survival game where players can recruit AI followers or friends into 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 far larger staff.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, explains the team’s ambition: "We set out to be disruptors. Everyone told us a twelve‑person team couldn’t deliver a game of this scale, but we knew from indie filmmaking that we could punch well above our weight." The studio’s founders bring a wealth of experience from low‑budget cinema, where they learned to stretch limited resources into compelling narratives.
After 80 pitch meetings, they finally secured equity financing from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, both of which took stakes in Wolf Haus. The founding trio’s Hollywood pedigree runs deep. 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 Star Citizen venture.
Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. This blend of film‑industry know‑how and gaming ambition gave Wolf Haus a unique perspective on storytelling and production.
Join Us originated from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "Unreal was free to download, and I’d been a gamer forever, but the barrier to actually creating something felt huge," he says. He taught himself the engine through YouTube tutorials, eventually crafting a few modest prototypes.
The concept that stuck was a doomsday cult simulator that merged survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics—essentially a love letter to the movies and games he adored. He built a proof‑of‑concept demo, expecting it to hit a technical wall soon after. When he showed it to Abbott, the latter recognized its potential and introduced it to Dooma, the studio’s early investor.
Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, had a career that spanned film production, screenwriting, and video‑game narrative work. He contributed writing to titles like Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, Assassin’s Creed, and Batman: Arkham Origins through his company Sekretagent Productions. In the 2010s he founded several tech ventures, most notably the cannabis formulation firm Ebbu, which sold for roughly C$430 million. After selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote island restaurant in Canada, intending to retire.
Yet a call from his old Hollywood Hills roommate, Michael Abbott, pulled him back. "Joe sent me a video of his prototype, and it blew my mind.
I came out of retirement to help," Wendschuh recalls. He then recruited Reid Schneider, former VP at Warner Bros.
Games and now head of Raccoon Logic, as a strategic advisor, and brought on Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer. With the core team in place, the next hurdle was funding—an especially tough task during the industry downturn of 2023‑24. After initial outreach, Wolf Haus signed with CAA (Creative Artists Agency) and resumed pitching in 2024, eventually closing a seed round with Lifelike Capital and Krafton.
Wendschuh notes that CAA’s representation, which also includes titles like 007: First Light, and the presence of seasoned veterans such as Schneider and Chartrand, were instrumental in winning investor confidence. Despite the high ambitions, Join Us is being built by just 13 full‑time staff members.
Dietsch emphasizes the importance of a small‑team culture: "Everyone has a voice, everyone touches the creative side, and the game feels like a product of a tight‑knit group rather than a faceless studio." To make such a scope 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.
The first year of development was split between ideating gameplay and constructing the internal tools that would keep the project from collapsing under its own weight as the world expanded. This tool‑centric philosophy also aligns with the equity‑funding model: Krafton and Lifelike’s capital allowed the team to build these utilities without the pressure of immediate revenue.
Wendschuh clarifies the financing structure: the game is essentially self‑funded by the equity partners, with a small amount of project finance earmarked for marketing. "Our investors benefit from the studio’s enterprise value, so they support our tool‑building ethos even if it slows short‑term development," he says.
When asked about generative AI—a hot topic in game development—both Dietsch and Wendschuh are unequivocal: the studio does not employ AI for creative work. "We believe a human touch is essential. Using an AI to generate assets would defeat why we get up every morning," Dietsch asserts.
Wendschuh adds that the only AI tools they use are mundane productivity aids for scheduling and email. Ironically, Krafton, which brands itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in the creative pipeline. This mirrors a similar stance taken by Krafton‑owned Neon Giant, which publicly distanced itself from the parent’s AI pivot. Both studios argue that AI threatens jobs for voice actors and artists, and they are committed to preserving those roles.
Indeed, the six‑kilometre‑square map in Join Us is entirely handcrafted, and the game’s 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human performers—a point the team proudly highlights as a testament to their indie ethos. Dietsch also reflects on the differences between film and game creation. In cinema, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring greenlights, star attachments, and massive budgets. In contrast, a game concept can be prototyped within hours, allowing immediate iteration.
"You can have an idea this morning, drop it into the engine, and see it in action by lunch," he says. Wendschuh notes that while film production is front‑loaded with high‑stakes negotiations, games have fewer gatekeepers, making it easier for small teams to achieve success without A‑list talent.
Both founders agree that storytelling is the core driver, regardless of medium. "Whether you’re making a movie or a game, you’re delivering an experience, telling a story, and engaging an audience," Dietsch concludes, noting that his childhood fascination with both cameras and programming set him on this dual‑path, and that the coin‑toss that sent him into games has led to a uniquely Hollywood‑infused indie adventure.