Senior Assassin: A Soaking Saga
You may have heard about something taking place amongst the senior Class of 2024 that to some might seem quite alarming: Senior Assassin. Despite the threatening name, it is a game between seniors as a way to have some fun (and competition) before they graduate. So, The Barefoot Times decided to interview a group of seniors about this perplexing competition.
First, The Barefoot Times talked to one of the seniors who participated but sadly had already been eliminated, Giuseppe DiMassa ’24. To familiarize us with an overview of this game, DiMassa said that in Senior Assassin “people are assigned to targets [but who is assigned to] the targets [is] kept secret from the victims, and the goal is to assassinate your targets a set distance off-campus using a miniature water gun.” He also brought up that, once your victim is assassinated, their previous targets are taken up by the assassins, creating “a cycle of targets and victims through the grade.” Students are in teams of two, and for an assassin to have an assassination count, both members of the target team must be shot.
However, the rules are not quite as simple as this. Farrah Mackenzie ’24 is now one of the two people enforcing the rules and running the game after it was started by Chloe Zavistovski and Iliana Muller. Some notable rules include not being able to assassinate others at school, inside someone’s house, at someone’s job, or in an establishment–or as Mackenzie said, “use common sense.” which she agrees “is a little iffy.” In addition to these, the borders around the school shrinks every week by a tenth of a mile, meaning that when these interviews were conducted, there was only a 0.3 mile safe zone around the high school.
But, what takes place when there is an out? Well, this is where Mackenzie and Lila Williams ’24, the other current mediator, come in. The person who makes a kill must do it with a water gun and record the event, sharing it with the whole grade so people know it is legitimate. When this happens, as Mackenzie says, “we are the mediators, we run the Instagram account and are monitoring who assassinates who. We make the final call on if a kill counts.” However, sometimes the rules are not so clear, since Zavistovski and Muller originally made the rules and a couple of things that have come up in the game were not included in the rule list. Williams says, when a kill happens, “it’s a bit stressful because we had a rulebook at the beginning, but there’s a lot of loopholes going on, so it’s hard to keep track of what’s legal and what isn’t legal.” They usually just have to make their best guess and move on because they are not allowed to add any rules, but Mackenzie does mention that “there’s usually some sort of argument that goes on” around what should and shouldn’t count and “that means that Lila and I have to discuss it.” They try to split up the work when they can, but it has still been a lot of work for them.
One thing that has come up that has caused some issues is that participants must leave their phone’s location on at all times. The game is run through Life 360, an app that can track each participant’s current locations. But, some people have been accidentally (and possibly purposefully) leaving their phones at their homes or giving them to other people so no one knows their true location. This was not clarified in the rulebook, so some debates have occurred over this.
The ways that seniors have been assassinated, or nearly assassinated, are quite interesting. DiMassa mentioned that he met his end “at the Americana getting a suit tailored for prom,” when Sacha Smith ’24 “waited outside for 20 minutes to shoot me,” and succeeded. He admits, “I’m a little bit bitter about how I was eliminated, but I kind of respected Sasha for it at the same time.” Other people have been shot on the way to their cars, at Vallarta, or in even more elaborate schemes such as getting to people’s houses early in the morning to target them on their way out the door. Williams told the tale of one senior offering to drive his two targets to go assassinate their victim, but “didn’t shoot them until after they got their person.” As for avoiding being shot, DiMassa brings up that “the most sophisticated strategy yet developed is simply booking it down the street at all possible speed and hoping somebody gets stuck behind a red light.”
This game has not been without conflict, leaving some wondering if this is still just friendly competition. Mackenzie brought up that “as this was supposed to be a bonding activity, you would think that we would laugh at this and kind of be friendly with each other, but there [have] been some quarrels within, which has been extra stressful for me and Lila.” DiMassa also shared that “people don’t hang out with each other socially anymore, because people fear that they’ll be killed”–not exactly how one wants to end their final year of high school. Williams agrees with these sentiments, but does enjoy, as a mediator, how “everyone can talk to us about who they’re going to get and how they’re planning on getting them, because they know we aren’t going to tell anyone.”
But, people do seem to be finding some joy in all of this, most agreeing that it has been fun. DiMassa even did recommend that other grades follow suit, but did say, “I think it would have been more fun in the fall because we’re going to spend our last month of high school not seeing each other.” He also recommended having clearer and more limited rules so that people “don’t kill each other willy-nilly.”
It will be interesting to see how all of this plays out in the end, who ends up winning, and also how this will play out in future years. Overall, it is important to keep in mind the potential repeat issues in the future, but the Class of 2024 does seem to be having fun, as it has been much talked-about among them.