Dr Mitchell McEwan is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computing at Macquarie University where he is Course Director for the Bachelor of Game Design and Development, Discipline Lead for the Game Design and Development major in the BIT, and Deputy Director of the Games User Research Lab. Dr McEwan is an active member of the CHI PLAY community, winning the Best Paper award at the first conference in 2014, an honorable mention in 2020, and serving as a regular reviewer and organising committee member, including as Proceedings Chair (2021-2023) and Technical Program Chair (2024-2025). Passionate about fostering inclusive, diverse, and welcoming spaces for teaching, research and play, he is chair of the School of Computing's Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging committee and a steering committee member of the national IDEATE (Inclusion, Diversity and Equity in Australian Technology Education) program.

Mitchell earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in acting from Rutgers University, and a Master of IT in Game Design from Queensland University of Technology, before undertaking his doctoral studies at QUT on The Influence of Naturally Mapped Control Interfaces for Video Games on the Player Experience and Intuitive Interaction. He was also a lecturer and founding member of the Games Research and Interaction Design Lab at QUT and is Co-Founder and Director of TBD Game Company, which developed the iOS game Endless Runner X. Interested in emerging gaming technologies, his work aims to explore new opportunities for interactivity, improve inclusion and accessibility, and develop techniques to evaluate and expand the expressive, affective and connective powers of video games.

As a games user researcher in the computing discipline I am passionate about the following research areas:

• Virtual Reality and Natural User Interfaces
• Player Experience
• Serious Games and Applied Gaming
• Games Ethics, Accessibility, and Diversity and Inclusion
• UX and Human-Computer Interaction in Games
• Intuitive Interaction in Games
• Game Design and Production

I am currently open to MRes or PhD supervision enquiries for games user research projects related to my research interests above. Before contacting me you are encouraged to develop a research proposal on the games-related topic you are interested to explore and investigate the HDR funding opportunities available to you. Please also include a CV/transcripts detailing your relevant academic and/or industry experience and publications.