Like peanut butter and jelly, whiskey and beer, or Ghostface and Raekwon, weed and video games are a timeless pairing. While people have been getting stoned far longer than they've been playing video games—researchers recently discovered charred remnants of cannabis dating back to the Neolithic era—it's safe to say that potheads were probably early adopters of Pong. Few things seem to jibe quite so well as interactive screen time and cannabis, but as a non-gamer (too busy wheelie boarding), I've long been curious why stoners are so obsessed with gaming.

So I asked a stoner who also builds and plays video games for a living. Felix, who wanted to go by only his first name, said video games are a form of escapism, weed enhances the escapist effects of video games exponentially, and we all need to get away these days. "Video games are inherently surreal," he said, "and I think smoking weed gets you into that mind-state where you're blurring a little bit between reality and the story, the surreal world you're in."

Felix added that he prefers to play video games at night, when he doesn't have any obligations. "I can really, truly get into it. Have an hour to two hours to sink into the depths of my escapism and just enjoy it. There are video games that don't let you get away from things, but those are not the ones I prefer to play when I'm stoned."

Graham McClure, the bar manager at Sizzle Pie, echoed those sentiments. "[Weed] enables that willful suspension of disbelief a little more," he said. "You can get more into it. You can forget you're sitting on the couch. Sometimes you just wanna shut it off. You know, shut off the real world and live in a fantasy la-la land."

Another stoner gamer I spoke to, who's also a recovering alcoholic, said getting baked as fuck and playing World of Warcraft—one of the most immersive games of all time—is a potent and necessary antidote to alcohol cravings.

"I was always kind of trying to run away from something [with alcohol], and when I quit drinking, I was left with this pervasive boredom," he said. "You can stop thinking about the things that make you anxious [when you're drunk]. You have to decompress somehow, and when you take away the only method that you had, you still want something that allows you to run away. Video games allow you to build an immersive experience that lets you get outside of yourself. I like to smoke weed and play video games because it allows me to really get away. Weed definitely enhances that ability."

Even for those who are not recovering alcoholics, the world can be a pretty shitty place. Cops are shooting people, people are shooting cops, people are shooting each other, people are running over other people in gorgeous beach towns over religion, people are maliciously harassing each other on Twitter, people are planning to vote for Trump, and so on ad infinitum. Things are legitimately bad, and most of us lack any sort of agency to make it better. But, as McClure pointed out, you've got a lot more agency in the digital world.

"There's still no Trump [in Fallout 3], in that postapocalyptic world," he said. "Or if he was there, you could probably kill him and get away with it. No consequences!"

If the thought of a little cannabis-enhanced Trump erasure sounds enticing, you are not alone. I asked one of the world's leading experts on strains, Leafly editor and strain reviewer Bailey Rahn, who's also a major gamer, to weigh in on the best bud for the experience. (Full disclosure: I am a reporter for Leafly.) Her first recommendation? Not bud.

"There is nothing quite like popping a 10- to 15-milligram edible on a weekend where your to-do list consists of only Witcher contracts and side quests," she said, in a reference to what I can only imagine is some kind of weird gamer shit. "These are great for highly immersive, sandbox, open-world RPGs [role-playing games] with impressive atmospheres. You can be as functional as a ham sandwich and still enjoy a nice nature walk through the stunning landscapes of Skyrim, Uncharted, Fallout, The Witcher 3, et cetera."

If you really want to smoke, Rahn mostly recommends sativa strains, because those tend to be headier and more focusing—ideal for getting really, really into a game. Durban Poison (sativa) was her go-to for fast-paced shooters and action games, Tangie (sativa) was her choice for gaming with friends, and Blueberry (indica) was her choice for melting into the couch and zoning out by yourself.

Whichever you pick for your gaming adventures, one thing is blissfully certain: You'll forget Trump for at least a few hours. That's something we could all stand to do more often.