Oops.

To answer your question, that particular situation would be better in any language that forces you to explicit the reference to "this" (or "self"). Imagine how we could modify C++:

  void member_function() {
    int local_variable++;
    local_variable++;        // This is okay
    member_variable++;       // That should not be allowed
    this->member_variable++; // This should be written instead
  }

Applied to the example in the GGP above:

  void load(Assets* a) {
    for (int j=0; j<this->m_numAssets; j++) {
      loadAsset(a[j]);
      this->m_numLoadedAssets++;
    }
  }

We see that every non-local access is prefixed by something ("this->" and "a[" here). The heavier syntax suggests a heavier cost, so the programmer will more easily think of hoisting those out of the loop, if possible (either manually or through compiler optimizations).