This two-volume set LNCS 12789 and 12790 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third International Conference on HCI in Games, HCI-Games 2021, held as part of the 23rd International Conference, HCI International 2021, which took place in July 2021. Due to COVID-19 pandemic the conference was held virtually.

The total of 1276 papers and 241 posters included in the 39 HCII 2021 proceedings volumes was carefully reviewed and selected from 5222 submissions. The papers of HCI-Games 2021, Part I, are organized in topical sections named: Experience Design in Games; User Engagement and Game Impact; Game Mechanics.