Helldivers 2 has been rated.

Popping up on the ESRB website, the sequel has been slapped with a Mature/17+ rating in the US due to its "blood and gore" and "intense violence", suggesting its on track to release later this year as planned.

"This is an action game in which players assume the role of soldiers attempting to win an intergalactic war," begins the game's description on the website.

"From a third-person perspective, players use pistols, assault rifles, sniper rifles, flamethrowers, turrets, grenades, and rocket launchers to shoot and kill enemies (e.g., robots, cyborgs, giant insects). Players can continue to attack defeated enemies, causing additional blood-splatter effects and dismemberment. Players can also shoot and kill human civilians during rescue missions."

The rating board also reveals that "combat is accompanied by realistic gunfire", as well as "cries of pain, and blood-splatter effects; some areas of the battlefield depict bloodstains and dismembered corpses".

As yet, there's no confirmed release date beyond the very wide "2023" window, but we'll let you know just as soon as that changes.

Helldivers 2, which was announced back in May, is the sequel to its well-received top-shooter predecessor, Helldivers. It secured an impressive "recommended" badge from Chris Donlan when it released back in 2015.

"Helldivers is a top-down shooter for up to four players, and it sees you blasting your way through procedurally-generated alien worlds as a cheery space fascist, spreading Managed Democracy across the universe. So far, so Heinlein," Chris wrote at the time.

"But this is also the latest game from Magicka developer Arrowhead Game Studios - a studio, right, whose logo shows an arrow going through somebody's head. In other words, you should expect a few quirks. The biggest of these is friendly fire: it is so terribly easy to shoot your own team-mates in Helldivers. It's so terribly easy to be shot by your own team-mates. Or stepped on by them if they've unlocked mechs. Hell really is other people."