Cool. I thought about trying this one but wasn't sure how to turn the flat pseudo-3D ramps into actual 3D objects at the time. Thinking about now, maybe with some cloning, texture editing, and the deform tool, something could be worked out.
You might be able to do do something like what JJXB did with River City Ransom to get the rider to move in and out as opposed to up and down. It is basically translating movement on the y axis to the z axis, and then zeroing out the y axis.
I've done something similar while messing around with Commando. I had a script that rotated all the background sprites 90 degrees and made the player move in and out of the screen instead of up and down.
I'm not familiar with the rippling effect you are talking about. Do you mean what is happening to the ramp in the picture you posted?