So to talk about the whole can easily be redressed to OT, I agree it could however there are some issues:
1. The ride must occur earlier the Empire Strikes Back, Vader was focused on finding Luke who was not really with the rebels at that time (he was on Degoba with Yoda) thus he had no reason to harass rebel recruits
2. Which character is going to replace Finn? Luke was a bit of a celebrity and the ace leader of the Rouge Squadron he could easily replace Poe in the ride but having him infiltrating a ship with Vader on it makes no sense, not to mention Vader has the ability to sense Luke. Nor does it make sense for Han who after Episode 4 is still very self centered and would never put his life needlessly in harms way. You’re stuck using a ride original character as your main character helping you. Everyone else has an easy story equivalent except Hux (Poe/Luke, Ren/Vader, BB-8/R2 with or without 3PO, Ray/Leia or Mon Marthma) or don’t need to change (Mon Calamari, Nein-Nub.). Thankfully Hux is easily replaced by a random Empirial Admiral .
3. The only other things (other then swiping FO stuff for Empire stuff) that would need to change would be the name of the planet the base is on (Let’s make it Hoth) and how you get away from Vader, for while it is totally in character for Ren to end up like a putz under a pile of rocks, Vader is another story. You could have a bunch of debris fall from the ceiling and have Vader stop it in mid air using the force but at the expense of releasing your ship. Then just before you get ejected you could get a Vader Noooo! and have the pod shake with cracks appearing on your windshield.
I still think this would be a wash as I don’t think having a random spy escorting you is fully countered by having Vader. There is however one time period where you could match everyone except the x-wing leader: Just before Rouge One (Finn/Cassien, BB-8/K2SO, Ren/Vader, Hux/Tarkin, Rey/Bail) I think this time period would improve on the ride, but unfortunately the characters are too obscure.
So basically, I doubt this ride ever gets reskinned to an OT time period, too many problems.