Billings high-school seniors are taking part in a national trend called Senior Assassin, a real-world game that pits teens against teens trying to hunt each other with water guns.While the game is intended to be a harmless prank to cap off students' final year, it has led to tragic outcomes nationwide, and critics call the game's name tone-deaf.Senior Assassin is played by graduating classes all over the country. In Billings, West High seniors have joined the chase.Watch West High Seniors talk about senior assassin: This water-gun game is fun for Billings high schoolers but sparking concern elsewhere"We run around with water guns. Just trying to shoot each other," Landon Wagner said Wednesday.Players wear goggles or floaties for a specific reason."The reason we have goggles on is like our protection basically. You can't get out if you have your goggles on," Wagner said.Each player gets assigned a fellow student as a target."There's this app. It's called Splashin, and basically it gives, like, the location of your target," Dylan Mainwaring saidThe job is to locate and spray the target within a timed round."If you don't get the target that you got assigned, you don't get them out. You get a bounty on you, and then anybody can get you out for a day," Ryan Gott said.A serious concern is that the water guns can sometimes look like real weapons, but the West students take pains to avoid that issue. They noted that the water guns they carry are bright and colorful, and they avoid anything black that could look like a real weapon.Nationwide, the game has resulted in serious injury and jail time. A teen in Indiana was charged with felony intimidation after police mistook his water gun for a real firearm. In May 2025, a North Texas student was severely injured after falling off the back of a moving Jeep while playing the game.Schools are posting warnings on social media, but for the students in Billings, safety is their priority."From our point of view, we're not hurting anybody, so we see no issue with it," Miles Kessler said.Organizer Amarah Jefferson set the ground rules and ran them by her school principal."Even though it's not, like, officially through the school, I went to our principal and I had him look them over and say, 'These are good.' And what he should add and make sure, like, it's to disrupt the community the least," Jefferson said.Certain places are off-limits for the game: Work, sports, house, school and church.The game wraps up at the end of May as seniors graduate."I don't want the community to be upset about it or anything. I promise I've designed it to disrupt as little as possible and I just hope everyone has fun," Jefferson said. ...read more read less