> Iirc Construct is a later iteration of Game Maker, or bought Game Maker, or something like that

I think GameMaker Studio is just a bit similar to Construct, a bit like how GDevelop or something like that also is, but I don't think there's much else of a connection there.

I do recall the old versions of Construct (which were renamed to Construct Classic and are long dead) targeting Windows and DirectX in particular, which was quite a while ago at this point, so perhaps it was even more similar to GMS, before their move to web technologies starting with Construct 2: https://sourceforge.net/projects/construct/

Still, I think that the new iterations are probably a good fit for educational settings, or just messing around with smaller projects and such, it's very nice to see them still working on stuff!