I think you're right, Unity is in my top 2 list for starting out (with the caveat to pass if you're targeting mobile since you'd need their not free plugins for that). Mono is just an open source .NET runtime so I'm guessing that's the same runtime they'd use if you wrote your code in C#. Python is an interesting choice, if they allow that Python is very easy to learn for beginners due to it's obvious structure and syntactic sugar.

I also like Alice to teach non-programmers about programming. It comes with a lot of free lesson plans (which you can follow yourself at home) and it visually executes your "program" by moving the sprites around that you put in there. By the end of several lessons most people will have a pretty good idea of just what might be the building blocks of a typical program. alice.org for that one.

GameMaker and RPGMaker are very easy to use and each have a wealth of tutorials. So everyone and their mother makes a top-down shooter in GameMaker, and a crappy jRPG in RPGMaker.

So the snobs (like me :p) frown upon it just because they are sick of it.

Find a book called "Secrets of the Sages". Find the first edition if you can. It was published around the time Tomb Raider 2 and other 3D games were still being refined, so it's chock-full of wisdom. It's got whole sections of advice from leaders of companies that don't exist anymore, like Ion Storm. While at first glance it doesn't seem prudent to take advice from a defunct company, the people who write in this book are still getting good work.

Basically the limitations and having to slog through tons of wannabe Final Fantasy crap until you find a gem.

Go have a look at the thread I started: "Free education online..." = put it up for you mainly since I saw a huge list of computer stuff. Go look :)

Thanks Virama!

@predcon: Okay I'll check it out. Sounds interesting.

Well seems like I got something to do over this Christams besides playing Call of Duty Black Ops combat training.

I'm fourteen(fifteen soon) and plan on being a game developer, although I have no experience as of now, I'm hoping that I can can find my way into the industry, after all what better job for a gamer?
I try to mix playing GOG games and Black Ops, I love hardcore mode it feels so much more realistic and as a sniper I can actually get a kill in close range with my automatic sidearm the cz75 since weapons do more damage.

A couple of threads you might be interested in:
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/who_here_has_actually_made_a_game/page1
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/indie_games_gog_style/page1

I am also planning to venture the games industry path. Don't know if I will enjoy it or if I have what it takes, but the worst that can happen is that I discover I don't and try something else. Better than spending the rest of your life regretting.

Good luck, maybe we shall bump into one another in the future :P.