I've been wanting to get into game dev for a long time now. I started to get serious around 5th/6th grade when I bought some game making app and had a pretty good run with it, though none of those games were worthy of praise. I did sprite work for my friend along with mechanic planning for a few of the games he put out (Unlike my crappy cookie-cutter program, he taught himself C++), but didn't end up going anywhere. Then I got into games like Blockland and learned how to 3d model and a little scripting. The next step for me was to learn an actual language, but it wasn't really happening due to me finishing school and whatnot. I tried learning XNA, but I didn't really have enough time to learn anything. And now with a month off of school for Winter break, I'll have a lot more time to myself, plus I have easy classes next semester, so I'll have freetime there as well. Point is, I want to start making games, but I'm not really sure where to start. I've had some basic programming classes, so I'm not completely new to this, but I'm looking for either a language or an engine that'll allow me to do one of a two specific ideas.
1st idea: A game that'll support Gears-style player control (meaning mainly the cover system).
2nd idea: support 2d top-down games.
