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 pig‑drawn carts, wielding machine guns before the screen fades to a massive, Cthulhu‑like mass of tentacles. What didn’t make the cut, according to Joe Dietsch—CEO and creative director of Wolf Haus Games, the studio behind Join Us—was the now‑infamous snake gun.
"One of the team members’ kids suggested a snake‑shooting weapon," Dietsch recounts. "We had a modular gun system that let us prototype something in about thirty minutes, so I built a gun that fires snakes on the fly.
The kid went nuts, and the weapon stayed in the final build." That anecdote captures the chaotic, over‑the‑top gameplay that Join Us promises: an open‑world sandbox where players can recruit followers—or teammates in co‑op mode—to serve a 1970s‑style cult. It also illustrates the studio’s technology‑first mindset, which has allowed a small crew to produce a high‑fidelity, large‑scale title.
Michael Abbott, Wolf Haus’s chief operating officer, summed up their ambition: "We set out to be disruptors. We told ourselves we could build a AAA‑ish experience with just a dozen developers, and everyone thought we were dreaming." The team’s confidence stems from a background in low‑budget, high‑impact productions. "We come from indie film,” Abbott says.
“We’re used to punching far above our weight.” After 80 pitch meetings, Wolf Haus finally secured equity funding from Krafton and Lifelike Capital, giving the studio the financial runway it needed. Wolf Haus’s founders have deep roots in Hollywood.
Dietsch studied film at Chapman University alongside Louie Gibson—son of Mel Gibson—who later co‑founded Wolf Haus and 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 started by Chris Roberts before his shift to Star Citizen.
Abbott later produced movies such as Fight for ’84 starring Jamie Foxx. The genesis of Join Us traces back to Dietsch tinkering in Unreal Engine. "Unreal is free to download, and I’d always loved games but felt the barrier to creation was huge," he explains.
"I started learning from YouTube tutorials, built a few tiny prototypes, and eventually settled on a doomsday cult simulator because it merged my love of survival games, grindhouse cinema, and the idea of an interactive cult narrative." He built a proof‑of‑concept, expecting to hit a technical wall at some point. When he showed the demo to Abbott, the latter took it to Dooma, a partner that helped shape the project’s direction. Dooma’s CFO and narrative director, Dooma Wendschuh, began his career as a film producer and screenwriter before moving into 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 selling Ebbu, Wendschuh bought a remote restaurant on a tiny Canadian island, intending to retire. Yet, in classic Hollywood fashion, a call from his old roommate Michael Abbott pulled him back. "I was looking at the game Joe had made, and it blew my mind.
It convinced me to come out of retirement," Wendschuh says. He introduced the project to Reid Schneider, a former Warner Bros. Games VP now heading Raccoon Logic, and Schneider recruited Pierre‑Olivier Chartrand, a former Ubisoft Montreal programmer, as chief technology officer.
With a core team forming, the next hurdle was financing—a difficult task during the industry downturn of 2023‑24. The studio pitched relentlessly, eventually partnering with Creative Artists Agency (CAA) for representation.
Their persistence paid off: Lifelike Capital and Krafton provided a seed round that allowed Wolf Haus to keep development in‑house. Wolf Haus now operates with just 13 full‑time staff members.
Dietsch emphasizes that the small size is intentional: "We wanted everyone to have a voice, to touch the creative process, and to feel ownership of the game." To make such an ambitious open‑world title feasible with a tiny crew, the studio invested heavily in custom tooling from the outset. "Every system must be scalable and debuggable by a single person," Dietsch notes. "We built a toolkit that lets us expand features across a massive map without the project collapsing under its own weight.
The first year was as much about building those tools as it was about designing gameplay." The equity funding model gave Wolf Haus the breathing room to perfect these tools. "Krafton and Lifelike are equity partners; their investment finances the game directly," says Wendschuh. "We’re essentially self‑funded, only taking on a modest amount of project finance for marketing later on." One of the most striking aspects of the studio’s philosophy is its rejection of generative AI for creative work. When asked about AI, Dietsch gave a concise answer: "We don’t use any generative AI.
The human touch is essential to us." Wendschuh adds nuance: "We have a few AI subscriptions for mundane tasks like calendar management and email drafting, but nothing that touches the creative side of development." Even Krafton, which has branded itself as an "AI‑first" company, insisted that Wolf Haus stay clear of generative AI in the creative pipeline. This mirrors the stance of Neon Giant, another Krafton‑owned studio that publicly denied using AI for game creation.
Both studios argue that AI threatens jobs for voice actors, artists, and other creatives. Indeed, Join Us’s six‑kilometre‑square map is handcrafted, and its 15,000 voice lines were recorded by human actors—a point the team proudly highlights as a testament to their commitment to artisanal production. Dietsch reflects on the contrast between filmmaking and game development.
In film, an idea can take years to materialise, requiring approvals, casting, and a lengthy production schedule. In games, he says, an idea can be prototyped in a single morning: "You can drop it into the engine, see it instantly, and start iterating. That immediacy is exhilarating." Wendschuh observes that film production is heavily front‑loaded, with massive coordination required to secure a few high‑profile names before a project ever gets greenlit.
By contrast, the video‑game industry has far fewer gatekeepers. "You don’t need an A‑list star or director to get a game published; the barriers are lower, and the odds of success are higher," he explains. Both founders agree that the core creative impulse is the same across mediums: delivering an experience, telling a story, and engaging an audience.
"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 says, recalling his early programming on a TI‑83 calculator. "Whether you’re making a film or a game, you’re crafting an experience and a narrative, and that doesn’t really change." Join Us therefore stands as a testament to what a small, tightly knit team can achieve when they combine Hollywood know‑how, tech savvy, and a refusal to rely on shortcuts like generative AI.
The game promises a bizarre, satirical cult adventure, built from the ground up by a dozen passionate creators who believe that a human‑centric approach still yields the most compelling interactive experiences.