Dexterity Software was a

computer game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual feedback from a display device, mo ...

company founded in 1994 in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

by Steve Pavlina. It began as a traditional retail game developer, but later changed to a

shareware Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer. ...

model. In 2004, Dexterity Software relocated to

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

. The company ceased operations in late 2006.

Games

Dexterity Software published and/or distributed over a dozen games including the following: * Dweep and Dweep Gold (2002) *Fortune Raiders and Pirate's Plunder (1995, for 16/32-bit Windows) *Aargon Black Box (2003, for Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP) * Aargon Deluxe (2002, for Windows 95/98/NT4/2000/XP) * Blastorama (2003, for Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP) * Fitznik (2001, for Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP) * Fitznik 2 (2004, for Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP) * Gold Sprinter (2003, for Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP) * JumpStar (1999, for 16/32-bit Windows) * Rocknor's Bad Day (2003, for Windows 98/NT4/ME/2000/XP) * Rocknor's Donut Factory (2004, for

Windows 98 Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the second operating system in the 9x line, as the successor to Windows 95. It was Software ...

or later) * SNOWY: The Bear's Adventures (2003, for

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft and the first of its Windows 9x family of operating systems, released to manufacturing on July 14, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged ...

or later) * Stockboy (2002, for Windows 95/98/NT4/2000/XP)

Articles

The Dexterity Software website also hosted a number of articles relevant to software developers such as * ''If No Independent Developers Are 100 Times Smarter Than You, Then Why Do Some Get 100 Times the Results?''; and * ''If You've Tried Everything Imaginable And Your Product Still Won't Sell, Here's What You're Missing''. The significance of these articles was recognised by the

Association of Shareware Professionals The Association of Software Professionals (ASP), formerly Association of Shareware Professionals, was a professional association for authors and developers of freeware, commercial, and shareware computer software. It was formed in April 1987, and ...

who listed Steve Pavlina on their

Hall of Fame A hall, wall, or walk of fame is a list of individuals, achievements, or other entities, usually chosen by a group of electors, to mark their excellence or Wiktionary:fame, fame in their field. In some cases, these halls of fame consist of actu ...

page, noting that he had had "a significant, lasting influence on others via his articles and postings."

Closure

Dexterity Software closed on October 31, 2006, when the founder Steve Pavlina retired from game development to focus on a personal development web site and blog, StevePavlina.com.

References

Video game companies based in California Defunct companies based in Greater Los Angeles Defunct video game companies of the United States {{computer-game-stub