The capacity to deceive is a hallmark of cognitive sophistication. Researchers often use games requiring deception to study the development of this capacity, assuming such games effectively isolate the cognitive aspects from sociomoral considerations. In three studies we challenge this assumption by explicitly giving 36- to 83-month-old Singaporean children (N = 279) permission to deceive in such a game. We initially hypothesized that granting such permission would increase deception by reducing