IntentGrid – An LLM benchmark requiring spatial reasoning and 3-step planning

I’ve been experimenting with a different kind of LLM benchmark, and wanted to share it here for feedback.

IntentGrid is a language-only, turn-based competitive game designed to test strategic planning, spatial reasoning, and long-horizon decision making in large language models.

Instead of puzzles or static tasks, models play a 40-turn adversarial game on a 13×13 grid. Each turn, they must:

analyze a dense board state,

reason about future congestion and forced combat,

express intent in natural language,

and output a strictly validated action plan.

Because 80 units are spawned over 40 turns on a 169-cell board, the system guarantees saturation: combat is unavoidable, and passive survival fails. Timing, positioning, and coordination matter more than tactics alone.

A concrete match example (Kimi vs Gemini): https://intentgrid.org/match/25f2530d-c7e6-4553-b231-dff4a98...