Pocket Gamer Connects will be heading to Vancouver for the first time ever on 28-29 June.

Tickets are still available.

So, to give you a hint at what you can expect, we're shining the spotlight onto our speakers to provide a deeper look at the personalities who will be taking the stage.

• Mike Inglehart is Creative Director at Vancouver-based developer and publisher Hothead Games.

PocketGamer.biz: Tell us about your company's role in the mobile games industry.

Mike Inglehart: Hothead was founded 10 years ago, having come from the console world. For the last several years we’ve been focused exclusively on mobile, and today we are one of the biggest developers of mobile FPS and shooter games in the world, with titles like Kill Shot and Kill Shot Bravo.

Shooter games have always been one of the most successful genres for consoles and PC gaming, but they have not yet become a mainstream fixture for mobile devices.

We’re trying to fix that, and we think we’ve found just the right combination of gameplay, graphics and heart-thumping action to do it.

Kill Shot Bravo is your latest release. How is the game performing, and what's next on the agenda?

It’s doing great. Kill Shot Bravo has been downloaded by tens of millions of players and has been very well reviewed by fans and professional critics alike.

We just released a new 1.7 update that introduces Alliances, which brings the next generation of social, multiplayer FPS gaming to mobile devices. Our players have been asking us to bring this type of social functionality to the game for a while.

It was not an easy undertaking from a development perspective, but we are glad to report that now players can forge Alliances with other players to complete important missions, take on an evil enemy, or even declare war on opposing Alliances in head-to-head battles.

It’s a major step forward for the entire genre.

One of 2016's trends so far seems to be an increasing transition towards more core and PvP experiences. As a developer in that space, do you find that encouraging or intimidating?

Both! Of course, we are glad to see this movement taking place, and we’d like to think that we’ve played a role in helping it come to fruition, but at the same time it really makes you step up your game when you see so many other developers creating such amazing core experiences.

But we don’t really worry about what other developers are doing.

We are just focused on building the best, most intense experiences possible, and we are fortunate enough to have a great track record to fall back on with both our Big Win Sports series which is completely PVP based and our Sniper Duel PVP Mode in Kill Shot Bravo.

Having some of the most talented designers and developers in the space, we are confident that we will continue to be one of the companies leading the industry forward in this area.

As part of Canada's largest independent game company, what will you be hoping that attendees of PGC Vancouver's indie track will learn from your talk?

In the end, we hope that attendees will understand some of the important aspects that a mobile designer should consider focusing on in order to stay ahead of the game in this incredibly fast-moving space.

You can find out more about all the speakers at Pocket Gamer Connects Vancouver here.