Hard to say without knowing what kind of game you want to make. I would say look to the games you play that inspire you and to which you aspire to make, then look up what engine they use. For instance, I really like Nuclear Throne and might some day try to make something similar. If I did I would use GameMaker since that's what they used and thus it can probably let you do a lot of what I liked about that game with ease, such as the ultra-juicy hit feedback.

If on the other hand you like Slime Rancher, well it uses Unity and probably that would be a better choice than GameMaker for that kind of game.

I also second Godot though, which is not widely used by many projects but seems awesome to me and totally capable of moving a 2d game out the door quickly.