my $0.02 on the subjects at hand. I learned on Blender, and had always heard how much better max was. I was so excited when I finally got a chance to use max in school, and, ultimately, dissapointed. Why? Three words; “integerated game engine” 
, I also started learning some of the shortcomings other software had compared with Blender, including other game engines. I did a quick demo of the engine for an instructor( just a ball that moved when you pressed the arrow keys) and he asked me where I coded that in. Don’t other engines have logic bricks? Another feature that’s important to me; cross platform. Max gets a big fat F on that one. My ultimate goal is to design cross platform games.
BTW one of my instructors( who works for a local game company ) told me that Blender was for ameture hacks. Maybe off topic, but I was offended and needed an excuse to vent.