Development time efficiency can be a very powerful aspect of a language. I don't find Assembly to have any practical power for game making.
It's fun and educational, but real ultimate game-making power comes from finishing games.

Don't ya just love language wars? The biggest problem is that people really are missing the most important point. A completed project ALWAYS has been performance then an uncompleted one. Computer languages are just tools. When I am doing much of my work for microcontrollers, I am often working in Assembly or C, because the compilers are not very good. When I am doing desktop dev, I often use C# just because I can get the project out the door a lot quicker then if I was using C++. There is a current project I am doing a mix of C# and C++ because one of the underlying libraries does not want to play well with managed code.

Don't get tied up in the language, focus on the goal. If the "easier" language will get you there, then use it. All of this "c++ is more powerful then x" is a complete crock. The modern compilers make fairly well written code, work just about as well no matter what language you are using. The trick is to learn what the "gotchas" are for any language you are using. C#, strings are often the biggest one. There are often viewed like a base type, but if you don't understand how they work under the hood, then you can give yourself some headaches.

So, use the language that works best for YOU,for the goal you are working.

And remember, just because C++ works well for someone else, does not mean it will work well for you. I can't stand Python, but I know lots of people that can push out some great projects using it. It is not that I think that Python is a bad language, it is just a bad language for ME!!!