Green+Black X-plorer

The first musical game I ever bought was Guitar Hero II, I got it at Best Buy and I only did so because GH3 was sold out. To my surprise GH2 was the standout title at the time because of its kick ass lineup of songs and the 360 exclusive X-Plorer guitar controller. Sure the guitar wasnt as realistic as the Fender that came with Rockband and it wasn't wireless like the GH3 model but it was undoubtedly unique and its white body was a canvas which I might someday customize.

But not with the stickers that came with the game. No, that was too easy, I had to give it a custom paint job and after seeing pictures online, after getting ahold of some acrylic paints and brushes I finally did the dirty deed yesterday.

First a brief history of the guitar: When music games were still only about guitars this game took me through both GH2 and GH3, when we finally went into the complete band game I admit I first went to the previously mentioned Fender but it simply wasnt as satisfying as the X-Plorer so I went back to it, I beat both World Tour and Rockband in hard with the guitar, formed a band, played online, bought a case for it, made some house calls. Its safe to say I have an attachment with the thing.

On to the customization. I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do, something similar to the many Japanese inspired rising sun customs I've seen online. The colors came from a Celtic change kit. Not that I'm a Celtic fan but green and black is some kind of nice. I wasnt exactly sold on the design so I sketched out a few alternates. The lightning bolt motif was a nod to Rivers Cuomo (of Weezer) whose guitar strap features the bolt, in the end I decided to include the design on my guitar strap. As for the design of the guitar I went with an abstract modification of the rising sun with more pronounced geometric figures in green and black.

With that ready to go the painting began. First to slather the green in the designated areas, this created a nice green-white design which I almost went with. Not wanting to live wondering what could have been I decided to go ahead with the black, after the first layer the results were looking uneven and shiny. Luckily I was later told that acrylics require more than one coat and sure enough the second and third layers made the coloring smoother and even.

The resulting guitar is actually pretty cool, the colors came out just how I planned and the design is surprisingly similar to the original sketch. The yellow lightning bolt might not match with the green and black but its bright enough to liven up the dark colors. The custom might not be as great as those out on the internets but I am way too happy with it, I did love my white x-plorer but I like it a lot more now, probably because its now a one of a kind.