I enjoyed the idea of the mechanic being "make people happier" rather than shooting them or running them over. It took me a while to work out what to do (and that the numbers were a measure of the happiness of the neighboring face) but once I did, I had fun cornering the red miseries and mercilessly "tickling" them. Lots of potential I thought for extending e.g. have the happiness being able to be passed on.

Nice to see a web game! It took me a bit to realize my character was the smiling one.  For some reason on my browser "Chrome" the prayer and raising light of hope buttons didn't seem to improve their mood.  An interesting mechanic that might have worked here would be to make the squares darker as the nearby people get more sad.   people who are happy (like your character) would be fully bright, but sad people would be in total darkness and if you don't do anything the whole board gets black, but if you succeed it's almost completely lit.