Anything but GameMaker Studio

Unity would probably provide you with the best balance between ease of use and creative power.

honestly, your best bet is to pick yourself a language and write a game without the use of a toolset or studio like gamemaker or RPG maker. You will learn SO much more that way about how games, computer languages and large scale projects work. I like python for things like this, and there are plenty of libraries to help you get started, but any modern language will work really.

haha,

Thanks for the tips guys i'll check it all out later tonight

I'm not saying he should use assembly, but...

http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100123015126/rct/images/7/7e/Steel_Volcania.png

Yeah the language you choose really depends on what type of games you want to make. For instance if you wanted to create a game for iOS devices you would most likely want to learn Objective-C. Also a lot of consoles have their own development kits which use a specific language so you might want to look into that too.

you should try to emulate "simple" games like tictactoe before jumping into a big project

i think a lot of people get into programming with flash/c# and just experiment with smaller games until they get a lot more experience, since the best experience is actually making them instead of studying how to do it

you'll learn how to weed out bugs fast and get a lot of experience fast

yeah i'll definitely be starting small and working up. Short goal is to be able to make a 16 bit gameboyesque game in a year if I start getting into it.

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i agree, but i'd highly recommend java tbh

python probably looks way prettier and runs faster, but i think the lower level language experience of java is even more beneficial, even if the learning curve might be more steep for proper OO programming etc

http://teamfortress.tv/forum/thread/16061-papa-smurf/

I've made games with C# before. It was fun and there was lots of documentation you could use.

I disagree 100%.

GameMaker version 4 is how I got started with programming in the first place. You start with drag and drop to learn the logic, then move up to scripting when you get more confident. The way everything is broken up and laid out makes getting started a cinch, and it's got very powerful features under the hood. It's a fantastic beginner's tool and I highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't have much experience. Plus, the scripting language is close in syntax to any other modern day language, notably JavaScript.

If you think you can't make something great with GameMaker, then maybe you haven't played Spelunky or Hotline Miami.

Pre-built systems still teach logic. Once you get that logic down, you want to know how engines work etc. The maybe after you can figure out how graphics and audio and other media works (even though libraries make it ez mode, installing a library as a newbie can take a long time).

Nothing wrong with learning abstraction from top-down. Only learn a language if you really plan to commit to programming (or want a taste to know you want out).

C++ with SFML or Allegro or SDL (Win/lin/Mac)
C# with XNA (Windows)
Java with JGL or libgdx (win/linux/mac/mobile)
Python with pyglet or pygame (win/lin/mac)
Flash, FlashDevelop with Flixel or FlashPunk
Php (can be mixed with HTML5, JS and databases for nice results) (browser/mobile)
HTML5 with Javascript (browser/mobile)

Roughly ranked from hard to easy, time to learn (or get proficient at) is relative to the difficulty.

This guy has walk throughs of many languages.
https://www.youtube.com/user/thenewboston/

It's not all that bad. It's more of a hobyist's tool than a super-serious programming language. Some friends and I have made some pretty neat stuff on it, including a multiplayer rpg with a 12-20 hour playtime. I "coded" (technically marked up) a sound engine and made all the music. The people who did the actual multiplayer/ gameplay stuff have moved on to bigger and better languages, but I think it was a great start for all of us.

Don't know much about programming but I know of this site: http://scratch.mit.edu/

I meant if you are going for professionalism and are looking to have a career in creating games you shouldn't use GameMaker Studio. Although I do agree it is a good place to start from what you mentioned

Also if you are planning on learning C# I would recommend these tutorials: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXNDSBA0DSk&list=PL8YsBsQXUFy-DQsVjT9PxlKbncusvayCT

dont use scratch
python is an easy language, java is pretty similar