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, unleash machine‑guns, and culminate in a showdown with colossal, Cthulhu‑like tentacles. One detail that didn’t make the cut was the infamous "snake gun," a weapon that Joe Dietsch, the CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, says was born from a child’s off‑hand suggestion. "My teammate’s son asked, ‘What would a snake‑gun look like?’ We had a rapid‑prototyping tool, so within about thirty minutes I built a gun that actually fires snakes. He was thrilled, and we kept it in the final build," Dietsch recalls.
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 illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has allowed a small crew 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 don’t need a hundred‑person team; twelve can do the job.’ Most people thought we were naïve." Their confidence stems from a history of doing big things on shoestring budgets.
"We come from indie film backgrounds and are used to punching well above our weight," Abbott says. After 80 pitches, the studio finally secured equity investment from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, giving Wolf Haus the financial runway to continue development. The founders’ Hollywood pedigree runs deep. Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson, son of Mel Gibson, who later co‑founded Wolf Haus 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 created by Chris Roberts before his Star Citizen venture. Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx.
This blend of cinematic experience and entrepreneurial grit informs the studio’s approach to game design. Join Us originated from Dietsch’s early experiments in Unreal Engine. "I discovered Unreal was free to download and started learning from YouTube tutorials," he explains. Though he had never built a game before, he managed to create a few small prototypes before committing to a larger vision: a doomsday cult simulator that fused survival mechanics with grindhouse cinema aesthetics.
He built a proof‑of‑concept demo and showed it to Abbott, who then presented it to Dooma, a partner studio. Dooma Wendschuh, Wolf Haus’s CFO and narrative director, began his career as a film producer and screenwriter before transitioning to games in the early 2000s.
He founded Sekretagent Productions, providing narrative work 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‑hill roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back into the industry. Impressed by Dietsch’s demo, Wendschuh helped bring on Reid Schneider—former Warner Bros. Games VP—and Ubisoft veteran Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand as chief technology officer. Funding proved to be the next hurdle.
The studio began pitching in the summer of 2023, a period marked by a downturn in the gaming market. Despite positive reactions, securing capital was tough. The team eventually partnered with CAA for representation, which opened doors to investors like Lifelike Capital and Krafton.
"Having CAA, which also represents titles like 007: First Light, and seasoned advisors like Schneider and Chartrand, gave us credibility," Wendschuh notes. What truly sets Join Us apart is its development model: a core team of only thirteen full‑time staff. "From day one we knew the scope and deliberately kept the team small so everyone could have a voice and directly influence the creative direction," says Dietsch.
To make such an ambitious open‑world possible, the studio invested heavily in internal tooling. "Any system in the game must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch explains. The first year of development was split between designing gameplay concepts and building the tools that would allow those concepts to scale across a six‑kilometre‑square map without collapsing under their own complexity.
The equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike allowed Wolf Haus to self‑finance the project, using the capital primarily for tool development and later for marketing. "Our investors are aligned with us because they benefit from the studio’s increased enterprise value," Wendschuh says. This alignment encouraged the team to solve problems by building custom tools rather than outsourcing or cutting corners, even if it slowed short‑term 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. Using AI to generate core content would undermine why we get up every morning," Dietsch asserts.
Wendschuh adds that while they may use AI for mundane tasks like calendar management, the creative pipeline—art, voice acting, level design—remains entirely human‑driven. Krafton, despite branding itself as an "AI‑first" company, explicitly required Wolf Haus to avoid generative AI in the game's creation, echoing similar stances from other Krafton‑owned studios. All 15,000 voice lines in Join Us were recorded by real actors, and the entire map was handcrafted, underscoring the studio’s commitment to artisanal production. Dietsch highlights the immediacy of game development compared to film: "In movies, an idea can take years to materialise; in games, I can prototype a concept in a morning, drop it into the engine, and see it instantly.
That rapid feedback loop is exhilarating." Wendschuh notes that film production is heavily front‑loaded, requiring high‑profile talent and studio green‑lights before any shooting begins. While anyone can technically shoot a backyard movie, breaking through without established names or distribution is rare.
By contrast, the game industry has fewer gatekeepers, making it easier for a small, talented team to achieve success without celebrity backing. Both mediums, however, share a common creative impulse: storytelling and experience design. "When I was six, I wanted to make either movies or games; it boiled down to a coin toss and whether I got a camera for Christmas," Dietsch reflects. "Whether you’re making a film or a game, you’re trying to give people an experience, tell a story, and engage them—that core mission never changes."