Space Race (video game) first game. After leaving Nutting Associates and founding Atari in May 1972, Bushnell spent a few days designing "Asteroid", but soon had to drop the project to focus on running the company. After the release of "Pong", Atari's first game, development resumed on the title in Spring 1973. Dabney has claimed credit for the game's final design, though "Pong" designer Allan Alcorn has stated that he and Bushnell may have been involved as well. "Asteroid", codenamed VP-2, was designed to be a racing game that would be simple to create to fulfill an earlier contract with Bally Midway; Atari had
Ted Dabney about ten years before deciding to leave the industry. Dabney had married, and later divorced, Joan Wahrmund, with whom he had two daughters. He later married Carolyn Dabney. After leaving the computer industry, Dabney and Carolyn managed a grocery store and later a deli in Crescent Mills, California. Around 2006, they moved from California to a property he owned near Okanogan National Forest in Washington. The Dabneys later returned to California, taking up residence in Clearlake, a city north of San Francisco. Their house was completely destroyed in the Clayton Fire in August 2016. A GoFundMe account was set up