Zoroa has always been one of my favourites from the crowd of creators whose levels feel more like tech demos, and thus tend to appear frequently in gauntlets and events, which is mostly due to the excellent theming and progression most of his levels have. Backstreet Boy is no exception, with the purple and yellow city theme being forefront in every single part but supported by constantly shifting intensity, effect work and other smaller details to match with the song. I think the theme is a great complement to the bouncy, synth-heavy dance song used, as everything feels alive and gives the vibe of riding through city streets in a car with your head out the window. I really like the silhouette part near the end too, the shift to lower detail and energy goes nicely with the break sections of the song, and with silhouettes being another very common element seen in city-focused media this feels very well thematically integrated.

My main issues with this level all revolve around the gameplay. Circling back to my comment on "tech demo creators", Zoroa makes use of many completely new 2.2 elements here like sideways gameplay, camera zoom/movement and the wall-jumping mechanic in the aforementioned silhouette section. I like this in concept due to the level's placement as an event level necessitating them to be flashy and eye-catching, but ultimately the end up usually feeling awkward and out of place. The sideways spider section doesn't really have any indication prior to starting and no thematic ties to the level, and the camera controls tend to feel quite unnecessary or even downright detrimental. This is mostly apparent in the wall-jump section as the camera locks to the player and makes it quite annoying to read the coming gameplay since everything is constantly moving around.

With some polish, Backstreet Boy has potential to be one of the best in the whole event, but even still it's a very solid showcase of skill from Zoroa. I think almost every aspect of the visuals is done nicely here, and Zoroa did a great job using and representing the song given. I'd love to see better incorporation of new mechanics and editor features going forward, as well as more effect work to highlight certain elements of the song like the drums or vocals. I would recommend this for Epic.