Your first introduction to the 1981 Donkey Kong arcade game?

[Barrels2007]

My Uncle Mike was a bartender in Michigan City, Indiana back in 1982.  I was in First Grade. 

One Sunday during a family get together, he told my father about a cool new arcade game that was making a lot of money at the tavern where he worked.  Since the nearby tavern was closed on Sundays, we drove over after dinner.  My dad and uncle made cocktails and kindly poured me a Coca-Cola.  Grabbing a handful of quarters from the tip jar, we pulled up a barstool and played Donkey Kong in that darkened tavern. 

I was completely fascinated by the game's colorful graphics - like something out of a Hanna Barbera cartoon - and Kong's loud stomping sounds that reverberated throughout the entire machine. 

All these years later, that moment remains such a sweet memory.   I raise a toast to my Uncle Mike every time I play.

[Sock Master]

I was in elementary school.  I don't quite know why I had to walk to school, but I did.  Maybe we lived just close enough not to qualify for the bus or maybe it was some other reason but it was a bit of a trek.
Between home and school there were not one, but two bowling alleys.  Both had arcade games.  There was also a mall with another arcade inside.
My mom never made me lunch and my school was pretty small and didn't offer any lunch service at all, so... I had to go fend for myself.
Sometimes when I had money I would go a local dive to eat.  Sometimes I'd go to the bowling alley and order some fries with sauce (which was basically like a poor man's Poutine - it was much more affordable for a little kid with only pocket change.)

Way back in the very early days of arcades, the first bowling alley had Space Invaders.  Which I found fascinating.  I never really played it much but the strange pixel creatures were interesting and I started drawing pixel creatures on graph paper in school.

It was the second bowling alley that had really went all out - they had about 10 games but they kept adding new games regularly.  And in retrospect, they had some really cool, rare or unlikely games.

One of the games they got was Donkey Kong.  And in actuality, I think it was the one and only real Donkey Kong I can remember seeing in all of Quebec during the 80s.   Everywhere else that I ever went those days had a Crazy Kong instead.

I was a little kid but I watched older teens and adults playing games in the arcades and a number of them could play for ages on a quarter.  I kinda picked up on their tricks and strategies and eventually got pretty good at a number of games myself.
At this exact time I was still a little kid.  But Donkey Kong was one of the games I kept going back to and eventually got pretty good at it.

When a became a teenager, sometimes I would never make it to school at all.  Sometimes I would go to the arcade for lunch and never make it back to school.  Often I would go to the arcade instead of home after school.  Man, those were different times.

But even now... when I walk up to a Donkey Kong cabinet in the wild... I will subconsciously remember the smell of bowling alley in my head.

[Mario500]

(suggestion of a different name for this topic: Your first meeting with a Donkey Kong (1981) game)

[jammvyy]

Crazy Kong in a Bowling Alley 83 ish never saw a DK cab In Toronto   

[Dk_madness]

My first run in with a Donkey Kong was in a small arcade in a shopping center in Dayton, Ohio. If I remember correctly, it’s was early 1983 or so. I used to sneak the 8 pack of returnable Pepsi bottles my parents had in the garage to the grocery store next to the arcade and get my .75 cents. Then head over and dump it all into DK lol. Needless to say, that .75 went quick.

[Mario500]

(first meeting with a 1981 Donkey Kong arcade game (or an arcade game cabinet in this case): inside a dental facility waiting room)

[homerwannabee]

In a small apartment laundromat in DeKalb.

[80sArcadeKid]

Never played it as a kid of 9 in 1981, unlike my handle. I'm a more mid 80s aracde kid (13'ish) started playing DK after watching Tecchio on Twitch a few years ago.

[Fly]

Maybe 1983ish at a mall arcade. I rarely went to malls BITD. But Crazy Kong was all over my hood for years before I saw DK anywhere. Fkn hack of CK! CK is the OG. Fk DK! 

Fly

[dnickolas]

Around 82-83 we used to go to this Chuck-E-Cheese on whatever day gave you unlimited free play for a couple hours. And there was a game in a cab that said Donkey Kong on it, but as an adult I'm 99% sure it was actually a Crazy Kong board. I distinctly remember the blue and yellow fireballs and how they were different from my Colecovision version.