std::ofstream ofs { "my_file" };
if(ofs) { ///sucess...
C++ has one big flaw the way I see it, and that is, it is incredibly difficult to learn well and it's very easy to teach badly.
I have been programming C++ for many years now, I still look back on code I wrote a couple of years ago and can see how my style has development, and I won't even dare review the code I wrote whilst learning the language.
That said, once you've straddled to learning curve, I really do believe that it is a great language for more than just niece core of use cases. Having learnt it there would be very few cases I would use C over C++, nor would I use an other compile "General purpose" programming language, like Java , D, Go or C#. The "next level up" for me is scipting with python or bash and the step down is asm or inline intrinsics. I am happy with C++ in the middle of that wide chasm.