Except what they did, is go to college, university, and finished high school before taking it on.
You're what? 13? You have little to no experience in the field yourself, and you're relying heavily on other people to do the work for you. You said you'd start out with flash games, yet you're jumping right in with C++, possibly the most difficult coding language. TM has every right to criticize your approach, I'd say.
Yep, agreed...