Hey guys-

 Looking like a spring project will be a play tower for the kids. Wondering if anyone else has experience here and what I should do about anchoring and any tips you can provide. Attached is a basic concept with a ladder and a slanted climbing wall that I will install holds onto. I have a slide as well but not sure if I want to put the slide on one side with a set of steps (for the youngest, 3 years old), or have it all be climbing. Probably add a cargo net or a pole, but any other ideas are appreciated. The basic dimensions are 4'x4'x8' (no including roof height). The two levels are supported with 2 joists equally spaced under the floor.

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Go to Sams Club. Buy their awesome one for $999. Be happy.  Wood playsets suck.

Agree, why re-invent the wheel, while you will walk away with pride in your work, the kids will have a blast on an item that won't give them splinters.

At almost 57 YO, I am amazed at the uber cool toys (outdoors stuff) that this generation has, cops & robbers, Army, etc., we had sticks and made siren sounds with our mouths and super crappy walkie talkies.

I am working with a 12'x12' area. Not a huge space. Don't think I have room for extensions or swing radii.

I built a deer blind that is 4x4x8' tall.  There is a railing around the top and vertical ladder for access to the 'roof.'  Unlike your design, my structure has plywood sheathing on the walls that provide resistance against racking and a door to get inside.

Since I wanted the option to move the thing someday, I didn't anchor it to the ground so it rests on concrete blocks.  In order to make it stable though, the floor is framed with 4x4 landscape timbers with plywood on the bottom and then the 'tray' was filled with concrete.  It's quite stable even when someone my size 6-2, 240 is climbing up the ladder and walking on top.

If you had the room, I'd advise building the structure horizontally on the ground and then raising and setting extended legs into pre-dug holes.  But it sounds like you don't have much to play with.

Good luck!

Edited to add photo

I built this'n...

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It's fifteen years old now, solid as the day I put in the last screw. Raised four kids, no splinter horror stories or anything.

For anchoring, the posts are just set a couple of feet in the ground.

(That power pole isn't as close as it looks.  Optical illusion/perspective thing)