So, someone on Twitch has been uploading footage of Roy, Ryu, and Lucas being played. I'm sure many of you already know this but I'm gonna discuss this here for those of you who don't.
Roy seems incredibly different from before. If you were all just thinking he'd be lifted from Melee, you were proved wrong the instant we saw renders.
Sakurai said he purposely made Roy bad in Melee because he was inexperienced. In the new renders, Roy looks much older, so we can only assume he's gotten much better and has grown.
During the gameplay, we saw some similarities to Marth. Yes, the base gameplay and moveset are based on Marth to a great extent, but Roy has been differentiated to the extent of Wolf or even Luigi (in my opinion).
Some of the tilts are the same, the throws are the same edit: I've been told Roy's throws are better than Marth's, but his up B has been changed a bit. It looks like it's closer to the PM up B than the Melee up B. Neutral B is still OHKO Flare Blade.
His fsmash is new, his usmash has new properties, dsmash looks close to Marth but isn't identical. Double Edge Dance is no longer a direct copy of Dancing Blade.
Roy is also much faster and generally more agile than before. His moves come out quicker than ever, and he's been transformed into a dash and slash sort of character, it seems.
He's no longer "fire Marth". Sure, he's close, but I'd still maintain that he's as different from Marth now as Lucas was from Ness in Brawl. Maybe more.