I agree the
Arisaka is a victim of bad press. Anything Japanese was considered inferior and when troops started getting a hold of training rifles and having them blow up it's an issue.
You can't really say the same thing about the Carcano. No one liked it when they had another rifle to use. The Finns got rid of them as fast as they could get their hands on something else and the Japanese for the most part put the Type I's into storage and it didn't even have the Mannlicher clip.
I own four of them and have shot three of the four. None are accurate, none function smoothly. Being adequate to hit a person at a couple hundred yards does not make it one of the best of the war because EVERY rifle used is adequate to hit a person at a couple hundred yards. That's not bad press, it's personal experience and it's echoed by most who have shot them.
The Enfield held 10, the
Garand held 8, those are the two primary opponents the Italians were up against so 6 rounds was no advantage to them.
Today on the market, the Carcano is the least sought after, the lowest priced milsurp out there. You can often get them for less than a Mosin Nagant and considering how they have flooded the market with them, that's saying something.
I like them, I think the 38 is a nice looking rifle, especially with the folding bayonet. But I don't consider it to be anything special as a design and the action is the worst of those that I own and I own most.