Senior Assassins: Soaked in Scandal

Targets, bounties, and water guns fuel a senior-year competition where no one knows who they can trust.

Contrary to popular belief, the game “Senior Assassins” is not a new social media born craze. The game “assassins” started on college campuses in the 1980s based on Killer: The Game of Assassination, a live action role play game. High schools adopted it with two things in mind: ending senior year with a heated competition, and water guns. The objective is to receive your targets and squirt them with water. If you get them, they’re out and you move on. Its seemingly harmless fun. At Rancho, juniors are allowed to participate with the seniors, adding more players for a lasting contest. The general rules are as follows; “Get your target before they get you”, with sometimes the option of immunity. Immunity often looks like goggles hanging around your neck or children’s floaties cutting off your circulation. With money on the line, students’ social image is tested, as these kids will wear these ridiculous items anywhere to save themselves. There are no lengths students won’t go to win. Parameters are applied. For example, Rancho Solano has forbidden any participation on campus. With such a vicious nature, this game inspires increasing paranoia in the students who manage to stay in, and countless events of controversy for the ones who get out. 

“I didn’t like how it dragged on longer than it needed to or having people hunt me down. I figured why not host it so I could still be involved with it.” - Brandon Carroll, Co-Host of the Game

Just as Rancho has forbidden on campus participation, many schools have banned the game altogether due to the increasing controversy and dangerous incidents taking place surrounding it. Before the game began this year, Dean Kotila warned the student body of juniors and seniors playing. “make sure your water guns look like water guns and not real guns” he advised, meaning they should be brightly colored, neon, and large enough so that they are determinable from a long distance. When Pegasus interviewed High School Principal Mr. Brown, he warned students to “stay away from someone while they’re driving, in a car, in a parking lot, or anywhere near a car.” Administration was right to warn against water guns that could be mistaken for real guns – in Florida, an off-duty police officer mistook a teenager’s toy water gun for a real firearm and shot him (luckily he recovered) in February of 2025 (CBS News) – as well as warning against playing anywhere near moving vehicles. In April of 2025 17-year-old Issac in Texas suffered a critical and fatal head injury after jumping onto the back bumper of a moving Jeep while trying to spray a target (NBC DFW). 

Managing these parameters and sorting out controversies within the game is no easy task, and with so many students excited to dedicate themselves to “hunting” their peers and pouring water on them, only two people were prepared to step into the heat and take on the challenge of running senior assassins: seniors Brandon Carroll and Eric Sawyers. But what is it like to be responsible for a game built around strategy, competition, and controversy? When interviewed about why he chose to host the game, Carroll said “I didn’t like how it dragged on longer than it needed to or having people hunt me down. I figured why not host it so I could still be involved with it.” When asked about the biggest challenge of hosting, Brandon shared that “Making sure that all 73 people playing are following the rules and on the same page. I must do all the logistics; make sure payments have been received and players get their money for bounties.” 

One of the most anxiety causing and drama-riddled events within the game are the individualized bounties. If a peer is secretly harboring a desire for revenge against you or your assassin plans to remove all immunity, they may anonymously place a bounty on you. The first bounty of the game was placed on Junior Rawan Nawas when Junior Zane Haldiman decided he needed revenge for scratching his car the previous year. Pegasus asked Rawan, “What was it like trying to survive a $150 bounty on your head? In response, she said: “It was surprising – I got in a car chase where Austin ran up my driveway. I think my family really helped me out here, because I called my dad and he immediately cleared the garage so I could get in before I got sprayed with water. Surviving this made me confident I’m going to win it all.” 

As the first elimination deadline nears, seniors and juniors are anxiously waiting for another special event to get their targets “out”. The players must decide for themselves if they want to abide by the limitations and suggestions provided by their superiors, and if they accept the risks moving forward into the game.